by Lan Chan
While I concentrated on the right mix of savoury spices, I could see my parents throwing each other concerned glances. They sat on top of the table in the row in front of my desk. “I can see you,” I said.
Dad massaged the back of his neck. “I guess we should talk about pulling you out of Bloodline.”
“Nope.”
Mama crossed her arms in front of her like she was cold despite the inferno Charming was producing. “Sophie.”
“I’m not leaving. Not like this.”
“It’s not safe.”
“No, it’s not.” It wouldn’t be safe for whoever decided they would go through my things and turn my personal space upside down. Maybe Max was right, I did have only-child tendencies when it came to my stuff. Thinking about Max made the corresponding fire in my chest burn brighter. I didn’t need the professors to tell me the claw marks in my room were shifter made. I’d been around enough of them to know it on sight.
“Don’t be ridiculous,” Mama said. “I know you’re upset but staying out of stubbornness isn’t going to help things.”
“But leaving out of fear is okay? You wanted me to be here. I’m staying.”
“That’s not what this is.”
I picked up a handful of dried beans and threw them into the chilli one by one like I was throwing rocks at somebody’s head. “I am not going to be intimidated into leaving.”
“I’m glad to hear you say it,” Jacqueline said. I didn’t glance up as she closed the classroom door behind her. “But I do think you should consider a few days off to settle yourself.”
Several chairs scraped. It was only then I noticed Professor Mortimer was with her. He came to stand beside me. “Smells good.”
I bit my tongue. I wanted to tell him I was imagining cooking the bones of the culprit. Yeah I was thinking about it but I would never actually do it. That was way too messed up.
“Can I please have a sprig of the winterflower?” I asked.
He raised a brow. Professor Mortimer wasn’t a Potions teacher but he was a high-magic mage. Some ingredients were universal.
“I’m not sure that’s a good idea, Sophie.”
“Just a little.”
I gave him my most pleading look. One of the advantages of being human and sixteen was that to a supernatural, no matter how dangerous I might be, I would always seem harmless. “What kind of spell are you working?”
“Sleep spell,” I said right away.
“Seems counterintuitive to use winterflower when you want to sleep.”
“It’s just a base. So that I can have something to measure against.” He thought for a second longer before moving off towards the glass cabinet. Professor McKenna would never have believed that rubbish. I was surprised he believed it too. Maybe he was just pretending because he was glad I wasn’t curled up in a corner rocking myself.
“What have you got?” Mama asked.
Jacqueline leaned against the edge of a desk. “There are no traces of biological or supernatural residue outside of that which was already in the room.”
Dad balled his fist. “How is that possible?”
Jacqueline shook her head. “It was the same with the dining hall kitchen.” Professor Mortimer returned with a sprig of a dried, thorny blue flower. Winterflowers were grown in the small arboretum in the Grove that belonged to the wood nymphs. Once upon a time, they grew in great swathes in the wood nymph dimension. In their fresh form, they exuded a scent that lulled people into a trance. Dried, the toxins became a natural stimulant. The perfect thing to go into my insomnia spell.
Professor Mortimer moved off to speak to my parents. I let them discuss me like I wasn’t even in the room. Using a scalpel, I sliced the petals of the winterflower into thin strips and dropped it into the chilli.
“Somebody has gone to a lot of trouble to ensure they’re not detected,” Professor Mortimer said. “Unfortunately, there are a few high-magic families who fit that bill.”
“What about the Barnabys?” Mama asked.
“It’s a possibility.” Jacqueline noted. “The thought had crossed my mind. Curtis and Bran are going through the room inch by inch. Bruce will take the rest of the evidence with him for safekeeping until we can work out what’s going on. In the meantime, we understand if you want to remove Sophie temporarily.”
I had a little aneurysm. If Professor Mortimer happened to look inside the storage chest, he’d find great grandfather’s diary. As much as I wracked my brain, I couldn’t come up with a reason to keep it. My only hope was to act as innocent as possible.
“It’s not happening,” I said. “And I want my room back when the Nephilim are done.”
“Don’t even think about it,” Mama said. “Anything could happen to you.”
We locked gazes. It had been a long time since I’d been able to get away with a tantrum. Right now I wanted to throw myself down on the ground and scream.
“If I leave now, then whoever did this will win. They’ll have successfully driven me away. I’m not going to let that happen.”
“Now isn’t the time to be idealistic,” Dad said. I could tell he was ready to ship me off right this instant. It occurred to me that we were having our age-old argument about Bloodline, only this time our stances were reversed.
“You’re welcome to stay if that makes things easier,” Jacqueline offered. “Our guest dorms are always prepared for visitors.”
My heart stuttered at the thought. Not just because having my parents at school was beyond mortifying but also because whatever was happening here might affect them. Mama was a kitchen witch but her gift was weak. Dad was an earth wizard. He worked as a geologist in the compound. They weren’t equipped to defend themselves. To be fair, neither was I. The only advantage I had was simmering in my cauldron. At times like these, my trump card was always history.
“You’re acting like this is the first time something like this has ever happened. Didn’t the nymphs try to scare off one of the Fae like this at the beginning of the year?” I turned to Jacqueline. “I heard somebody torched your office the first year you were made headmistress? Didn’t one of the Nephilim houses turn out to be behind that? Do you think I should run off and hide?”
“This is different,” Dad said.
“How?”
“You’re a student, for one thing,” Jacqueline said. “And –”
I knew exactly what she was about to say. “And I’m a low-magic user. I’ve got no way to defend myself against the other races. But I’m also the great-granddaughter of a serial killer. Either I’m to be pitied or feared. They can’t have it both ways.”
Professor Mortimer coughed. “At least we know the kids are paying attention in Magical History.” The look Jacqueline threw him could have felled a troll. She turned her gaze to my parents.
“It’s up to you,” she said.
Mama wrung her hands. “Is this what you really want, Soph? You don’t have to put on a brave face for us.”
Ha! I’d been trying not to complain too much about being here for their benefit and it had gotten me nowhere. “I’ll be fine.”
I snapped my fingers at Charming who instantly clamped his mouth shut. Smoke puffed from his ears. His scales turned a shade of red. Slowly, though, his colouring dimmed as the fire cooled.
I knew my parents would agree when Mama sighed. Dad was working around the clock at the moment because some stupid archaeological dig had hit on shifter bones buried in a cavern in Ethiopia. He was supposed to be there right now disproving their hypothesis. Mama was meant to be running PR for the mayoral campaign of one of the wolves. They were both blessedly distracted.
“We’ll keep a close eye on her,” Jacqueline assured them as my parents stepped through the portal Professor Mortimer opened up right in the middle of the room. Jacqueline blew out a breath when they were gone.
“Are you sure you want to go back to your room?” she asked me.
“Very sure.”
“You know you don’t have to pro
ve anything to anyone.”
I snorted. “I’m pretty sure I do, but this isn’t about that at all. I like my room. I’m used to it.” And I needed to be in there for this spell to work. Was I packing it at the thought of running into the culprit? You betcha. I was as terrified as the next person. But I looked down at the word “remember” on my hand and it solidified my conviction.
Jacqueline’s compact mirror beeped. She flipped it open. “Well, the Nephilim are done fixing up your room. You’re welcome to go back at any time. For the next few days, we’ll have the guards make regular rounds past your dorm. If this is the usual hazing gone bad, we’ll catch them sooner or later.”
“You can come and wade through your things if you like?” Professor Mortimer asked. I nodded. Unclipping the cauldron from its base, I lifted the handle and carried it with me. “You want me to take that?”
“No thanks. It’s not that heavy.” Biggest lie ever. It weighed a tonne. My arm was sore when we got back to his cottage on the perimeter of the school. My stuff had been placed carefully in the storage room built into the back of the stone cottage. To an unwitting observer, the cottage was nothing more than a quaint country building. Inside, I watched as every pocket of dead air was sealed over with magic. It ran in rainbow streaks around all the doors and windows. I’d bet no one in their right mind would try to break into this place.
“I’m going to have to keep the contents of the chest for now. It seems like they made a good go of trying to break the seal. There might be something in there they wanted.”
I swallowed. Brushing my palm against the caved-in lid, I reinforced the protection circle with a stun circle. As much as I liked Professor Mortimer, I couldn’t risk him opening the chest. I managed to salvage some of my toiletries as well as a wig or two. There were some clothes that hadn’t been slashed so I took those too. They didn’t match, of course, but it was better than nothing. I was trying to balance everything in my arms when I spotted something in the locked cabinet beside the fireplace.
“Is that Kate’s necklace?” I asked.
The Professor glanced up from where he’d been stooped over reading a moth-riddled book. “Oh yes. I suppose I should see if she wants it back. Not much use, though. The clay basically disintegrated over time.”
I peered in at what remained of the leather chain. It looked innocuous enough. “She’d probably just throw it away.”
The professor nodded. “Got everything you need?”
“I think so. There’s not much left intact.”
His lips pressed together. “Don’t worry, Sophie. We’ll find out who did this.” It would have been more reassuring if he hadn’t yawned just then. I’d seen Jacqueline do so a number of times during her chat with my parents as well. The weight of the cauldron was reassuring as he escorted me back to my dorm.
Overhead, one of the guards flapped his wings as though in greeting. They were going out of their way to make me feel safe. I waved as I pushed open the dorm door and headed inside. I had assured Jacqueline that I didn’t want anything to be said about what had happened. The last thing I needed was for anyone else to get any ideas.
While I’d put on a show of not being too worried in front of everyone else, my feet didn’t seem to want to venture back down this familiar corridor. My throat was suddenly dry when I stared into the long walk. It was looking extra-cavernous today. I blinked as a shadow moved across the hallway.
This was the worst idea ever.
13
My heart almost jumped out of my chest. It was only when Max sniffed that I was able to breathe again. So I wasn’t going to win any competitions for being stoic. Now I didn’t want to head down the corridor for other reasons.
“You’re not allowed in here,” I said. This time, it wasn’t something I’d made up. There were strict rules about being in the dorms of the opposite sex. Forcing my feet to move, I tried to appear nonchalant that I was holding my bathrobe draped over one arm with some panties tucked in my underarm.
“What happened to your room?” Max asked. “I can’t scent a single thing in there.” How in the world did he know something had happened? The façade of nonchalance that he’d always affected was gone from his voice. He was every inch a merciless alpha lion at the moment.
“Nothing. And I’d like to keep it that way.”
He tried to reach out when I slid past, but the look I gave him was scathing. His hand curled into a fist mid-air. He didn’t drop it entirely. We looked like we were standing in the hall playing a game of rock, paper, scissors. I’m sure he was used to doing whatever he wanted. It must be killing him not to just grab me and shake the answers from me.
“Did somebody try to hurt you?”
“I don’t know. I’m really tired.” It couldn’t be further from the truth. “Do you mind?” I inclined my head towards the door. He’d need to get out of my way so I could pass with all the stuff I was holding on to. Even though the hallway was dim, the night-glow quality of shifter eyes meant that I could see his perfectly. They were an intense moonlit grey that watched me with unwavering focus.
“I heard the guards say something clawed up your wall.” I didn’t say a word. “Sophie!”
The way he said my name made something inside me snap. “Listen,” I said. “I’m not really sure why you’re here.” I held up the cauldron past my hip. It really was weighing me down. “This isn’t really edible.”
This time he did grab me by the wrist. The cauldron was out of my hands before I knew it. He took a long sniff of the contents. His eyes widened. No way. There was no way he could distinguish the ingredients under the cover of all that chilli.
“Why are you making a chilli with winterflower?” Oh this was not good. He had the best sense of smell I’d ever encountered. I gulped.
“I’ve been feeling really tired. It’ll help me catch up on my Potions assignment for the end of the year.” I tried to sidle past.
“I don’t smell any fatigue on you.”
“That’s about the creepiest thing anybody has ever said to me.” I took the cauldron back. “I need to go.” I paused with my hand on the doorknob. After what had happened tonight, everyone was a suspect. Yet I couldn’t help turning around. “The guards are going to be passing by routinely.”
I didn’t hear him leave after I closed the door. To be fair, I hadn’t heard him move while he was there so who knew whether he was actually gone. He was right about one thing, the room looked like it had been sandblasted clean. Professor Mortimer had probably just magicked everything away. There was no scent. I dropped my clothes on the new bed that the Nephilim had to have teleported in. The cauldron went on my empty nightstand. I’d had a photo of my parents but the glass frame had been shattered. Moving to the wall, I placed my hand against the plaster. It was just a coating. The wall itself was made of stone. Everything felt hospital sanitary. Yet I swore I could feel the residue of something not quite right.
I raised my palm and traced the word remember with my fingers. Curling my hand into a fist, I grit my teeth. Okay. If I couldn’t remember what it was I needed, I would just have to stay awake until it came back to me.
It took me a few minutes to set up the circle. Unlike in a normal school, there were no rules against open flames here. It would have been impossible to enforce. I’d picked up a few candles and some chalk at Professor Mortimer’s cottage. His cupboard was a spell worker’s dream.
I placed the cauldron down on the floating wooden floorboards. Around it, I drew three wide concentric circles using pink chalk. Each circle was bigger than the other until they took up all the available floor space. I drew six lines bisecting the circles at even intervals. At the origin of each line on the outermost circle, I place a white candle. Runes was a subject I was still trying to get my head around. To be honest, they all kind of looked the same to me. At home, I’d spent more time trying to decipher the moods of the shifters than I’d spent learning the arcane language.
I had to use a textbook to
pick the ones I needed. After drawing the marks in each of the quadrants around the circle, I sat down on the chalk outline with the cauldron in front of me. “Ignite.” As soon as I spoke the words, a small pink flame burst beneath the bottom of the cauldron. I wasn’t a fire mage but being a kitchen witch had some advantages. I couldn’t make the flame any bigger than my palm but it would be enough to heat up the chilli.
Closing my eyes, I directed my magic at each of the candles in turn. One by one they flared until each was lit and the room was bathed in a soft pink glow. I took in a deep breath. Exhaling from my nose, I forced my eyes around this small room that had been my home during the school year. I might not have loved it here socially, but the fact I was able to call forth fire so readily was a testament to the education I was receiving.
Nobody was going to make me leave without my consent. As the chilli started to warm, I took out the vial that held the scraping of food die. I tipped the now-congealed liquid into the chilli and thought of beginnings. I tried to parse out the intent of the person who had come into my personal space.
Almost immediately, my eyes began to droop. My limbs were so heavy it was like I was being weighted to the ground. In my thoughts a shadow crept through the halls. The shadow wasn’t affixed to a physical body. It coasted through walls the way the Nephilim teleported through space and time. I tried to follow but I was limited by being corporeal. I watched as the shadow swept through a hallway I didn’t recognise. One by one it entered the rooms. Though it didn’t spend much time in each, the darkness seemed to grow denser as it moved down the hallway.
I really wanted to lie down. It had been such a long day. Just as the shadow morphed through a wall to come to a stop at the beginning of my corridor, my eyes snapped open. The chilli popped as it boiled.
Remember.
The word reverberated in my mind. Even though my stomach was churning from unease, I picked up a spoon and scooped up some chilli. After blowing it cool, I shoved it into my mouth. When the spicy, savoury sensation hit my tongue, the nausea receded. My stomach growled. Turning off the fire, I sat within the circle taking spoonfuls of chilli from the cauldron. With each bite, the edge of darkness in my mind cleared. My tongue burned from the heat of the chilli peppers, but it was the best I’d felt in days. I ate until my stomach groaned.