Daughter of Chaos

by Sarah Rees Brennan

  I wished the meet-up with Roz was going as smoothly as the new business. We usually couldn’t stop talking, but today our table was the only circle of silence in the whole place. Roz was staring at me apprehensively, as though at any moment I might enchant my croissant.

  “So, um, how’s the baby?” Roz asked at last.

  My aunt Zelda had stolen our High Priest’s baby daughter on the night of the Greendale Thirteen. Roz was called in to do emergency babysitting on the eve of Yule. December hadn’t been a restful month.

  “We gave Leticia to a woods witch,” I said. “For her own safety.”

  Roz boggled. “Does witch adoption usually work like that?”

  “This was a bit of a special case.”

  “I didn’t mean to sound judgmental,” said Roz hastily. “I’m sure you made the right decision. I was visiting Susie earlier. She’s still shaken up by the whole business with the …”

  Roz seemed to have difficulty saying the words. She turned her empty teacup around in its saucer, as if searching for inspiration in its dainty china depths.

  “Yule demon,” I filled in.

  The Yule demon had kidnapped our friend Susie. It’d been a whole thing.

  “Yeah. That.” Roz gave a small, uncomfortable laugh. “She said you and your aunts really helped her out. That was good.”

  “If you’ve seen Susie …” I said. “Have you heard from Harvey? Do you know how he’s doing?”

  There was a pause. Roz frowned at her teacup. She looked intensely uncomfortable.

  I guessed it was rough for everyone, when two people in a friend group broke up. I hoped that Roz wasn’t trying to think of a way to say, “Harvey and I get together all the time! We talk about how much he hates you. And witchcraft. And witches. And you.”

  “I haven’t seen Harvey,” Roz answered finally. “He called and asked me to go on a walk with him, but I was already seeing you. I told him we should meet up tomorrow.”

  I tried not to be jealous. I would’ve given anything for Harvey to call me.

  “How did he sound on the phone?”

  Roz looked up from the gilt rim of her teacup. Her eyes behind her big glasses, the amber of tea without milk, were always a little unfocused and usually warm. Not today.

  “Sad. Harvey sounded really sad.”

  I coughed, painfully. “How are you? How’s your sight?”

  “It’s not great,” Roz answered, her voice clipped. “Listen, Sabrina, hearing I’m losing my vision because a witch cursed an ancestor of mine was—a lot. I don’t know that I can talk about it with you.”

  I blinked. “But we’re best friends. We should be able to talk about anything.”

  Roz made a small impatient gesture. Perhaps she misjudged the movement, or perhaps her vision was too blurred to see exactly where things were. Her cup and saucer chimed together and then almost fell over the rim of the table. I murmured a spell, and the cup and saucer righted themselves. Roz jumped as if hearing the breaking sound that hadn’t happened.

  Mrs. Ferch-Geg bustled over to us, rescuing her cups and saucers.

  “Another cuppa?” she asked in her musical Welsh accent. “Some éclairs? I can see you two are having a lovely chat.”

  Roz’s mouth worked nervously, then went flat. “Actually, I have to get going.”

  The tea shop lady nodded, her elaborate hairstyle wobbling, and went to bring our check. I reached out across the glass-topped table and grabbed Roz’s wrist.

  “The curse isn’t my fault.”

  “I know it’s not,” Roz whispered.

  “I’ll find a way to lift the curse and help you. Roz, I swear I will.”

  Roz was already grabbing her stuff. “Give me time, Sabrina.”

  I watched her hands, fumbling as she tried to pick up her hat and scarf, and my heart broke.

  Once we were outside the café, Roz tried and failed to smile at me. It felt as though our friendship had fallen and broken on the floor.

  I’d already lost Harvey. I didn’t want to lose my mortal friends. I knew I shouldn’t push, but that was who I was. Either I pushed my friends, or I left them alone. I couldn’t work out a middle way, and I didn’t want to be without them.

  “Let me at least walk you home.”

  “No, Sabrina. I really have to go.”

  I watched as Roz scurried across the main street, worried because she was walking so quickly on the icy surface. Maybe my friends would rather be without me.

  She looked both ways before she crossed, but on the other side of the street was a white van. I watched Roz step out in front of the van and realized she hadn’t seen it against the snow.

  There was only a split second for terror. The van was going too fast. The roads were covered in ice. Teleporting wouldn’t be fast enough. I shouted the spell without even thinking.

  “This is not something she should face. Give me leave to take her place!”

  There was a whirl like snowflakes in a sharp breeze, and I found myself in the middle of the road with the van bearing down upon me. Roz was safe on the other side of the street. My face broke into a small, relieved grin.

  “I don’t like the scene I’m in. Let’s give it a little spin,” I murmured. The wheels of the van spun in the ice. The vehicle pirouetted, so I saw the black letters reading CAPITAL GLASSWARE on the side, then saw the van drive straight into a fire hydrant.

  The doors at the back of the van burst open, and the contents exploded outward. It was like being caught in a storm of glass. Sparkling shards cascaded through the air, clustering at my feet in bright heaps. It was finding myself in the center of a vast chandelier. It was a hundred windows breaking around me, all at once.

  I wasn’t afraid of being hurt. I was a witch, and Aunt Hilda and Aunt Zelda never let me leave the house without casting protection spells. But I could hear my aunt’s voice, ringing like a bell in my memory as the glass shards descended.

  Don’t break mirrors or glass, lest your year be a wreck.

  Roz rushed across the road to me, and half the occupants of the tea shop spilled out into the street. I gave Roz a hug and said I was so glad she was safe, and then hurried off before anyone could ask me questions.

  In my haste to get away, I ran into my old elementary school principal.

  “Watch where you’re going,” Mr. Poole muttered. “You little witch.”

  I hesitated, not sure I’d heard him right. I stood frozen, alone amid the ice and shattered glass, as he disappeared into the crowd.

  * * *

  I was still shaken up when I got to the Academy for Unseen Arts. The sound of breaking glass, first a crash and then a sweet tinkling melody as the pieces fell, haunted me even as I ran down the corridor. My footsteps echoed against the stone as though someone was chasing at my heels.

  There was no time to worry about bad luck or grumpy old men. I didn’t want to be late for class.

  Witch school didn’t close as long as mortal school did for the holidays, though the official first assembly wasn’t for a few days. No rest for the wicked, Father Blackwood said, sternly and often. We had several lectures to attend, even though we didn’t have classes, and we’d been given several assignments to do over Yule. One assignment was due to be handed in today. Sister Jackson, my most noxious teacher, had given us a huge project and then suggested we work on the assignment in pairs. Of course, nobody had volunteered to collaborate with the half mortal. I’d spent a couple of sleepless nights over Yule getting the work done on my own.

  Sister Jackson’s mouth twisted like a wire with too much weight on it as I whirled in the door.

  “Ah, Sabrina,” she said. “Here at last. I presume you have brought your detailed treatise on the scandal of Anti-Pope Joan, and its causes and effects?”

  I gave her a defiant smile as I unzipped my bag. “Would I dare show my face if I hadn’t?”

  “Who knows,” said Sister Jackson. “I’ve noticed you make many unwise decisions. You and the rest of the unruly Sp
ellman brood.”

  I flicked through my books, searching for the bound essay. I thought I’d left the project at the very top of my bag, but I couldn’t see it anywhere.

  Joy spread across Sister Jackson’s face. She gloated over me like a vulture over a dying donkey while I knelt on the stone flags of the classroom and searched desperately for my project. I even tipped the bag upside down. The project wasn’t there.

  I looked up from my books, tumbled on the floor, to the crowded rows of students before me. Students from the year above mine came to these lectures too, and I noticed three in particular. Once, I would’ve suspected Prudence Night and her Weird Sisters of playing a trick and hiding my homework, but the trio of magical mean girls and I were getting on better lately. My eyes found Prudence, her queenly head held high and her dark eyes observing the spectacle with faint interest, but I didn’t see the pleased malice I would’ve expected if she’d done it.

  I didn’t think this was a trick of Prudence’s. That didn’t change the fact my project had disappeared, Sister Jackson was leering at me with hungry menace, and there was no help to be found.

  Until a voice called out from the door behind me.

  “Sabrina and I did the assignment together,” claimed Nick Scratch, lying through his teeth.

  I twisted around from my undignified seat on the floor to see Nick bare said teeth in a smile that was both disarming and alarming. He produced a sheaf of pages, bound in scarlet embossed leather, presenting them to Sister Jackson with a flourish.

  Thwarted, Sister Jackson muttered that Nick and I were both late for class.

  “Sin is one thing, Nicholas. Tardiness is another. You may take your seats.”

  “I was so busy sinning, I lost track of time,” murmured Nick, gesturing me to a seat beside him.

  He was unwrapping a long black scarf from his neck and shrugging out of his jacket. There were snowflakes half melted in his ebony hair and on his shoulders, glinting like stars disappearing in the morning. I took my seat beside him.

  Apparently I’d also forgotten my pens, but a pallid boy across the way loaned me a pencil.

  When Sister Jackson’s lecture was over, I stood up quickly and told Nick out of the corner of my mouth: “You didn’t have to do that.”

  “I wanted to,” he said.

  The other students were filtering out of the room. I hugged my bag to my chest in distress, while Nick shouldered his bag and walked with me out into the corridor. He lingered as though he had nowhere better to be.

  “Let me assure you, Nick, I did that assignment.”

  “I’m sure you did. You don’t strike me as the type to neglect your schoolwork.”

  “Of course, I’m not a delinquent,” I told him, and he smiled.

  This wasn’t Nick’s blinding smile for the teacher. It was smaller, warm and private between us.

  “Sure. No petty rule-breaking for you, right, Spellman? You’re a rebel on a grand scale. Only stealing forbidden books and necromancy is worth your time. Go big or go do your homework. Your new hair is sexy, by the way.”

  “Oh,” I said.

  I hadn’t considered my new hair as being sexy or not. I didn’t really know whether I was sexy or not. On the whole, I hoped I was.

  Nick certainly was. Not that I would ever say so.

  I smiled cautiously. “Thanks, I guess. I’m not sure I’ll keep it. I thought I might dye it back the way it was before.”

  I’d signed away my soul, and my hair had turned white as the snow on the ground. I didn’t hate how it looked, but it made me uneasy. I’d always loved how my hair was the same shade as my mother’s in the pictures I had of her. At Yule, I’d summoned the ghost of my mother. She’d been a lovely golden-haired girl, mortal and sweet. Nothing like me.

  I’d tried dressing like the Weird Sisters to suit my new hair, but that hadn’t felt right. I’d tried calling my mother to me, and that hadn’t felt right either. I wished I could work out who this new me was supposed to be like.

  I remembered how Harvey’s eyes widened when he saw my new look. He’d drawn a hundred lovingly detailed pictures of me with golden hair. He probably wouldn’t want to draw me looking like this.

  I raised an eyebrow at Nick, who was apparently a fan of the hair. “Would you be disappointed?”

  He shook his head. “You’re sexy either way.”

  There was that word again. I might want to be sexy, but I didn’t know how to talk about it. I coughed instead.

  “I can’t believe I left my project at home,” I muttered. “I’m not usually forgetful.”

  Maybe I’d put it down in the tea shop, but I could’ve sworn I hadn’t even opened my bag. Maybe I’d left the assignment at home. I frowned, trying to recall. It wasn’t like me not to have my work in order.

  “That kind of thing happens to everyone. It’s just bad luck.”

  Bad luck. I stared up at Nick, stricken, and saw the shine of broken glass in his black eyes.

  “Something wrong?”

  I pulled myself together. “No! Of course not. Everything’s fine. Great. Peachy keen, jelly bean, as my aunt Hilda would say. Hey, welcome back from your Yule vacation in the Unholy Land.”

  Nick leaned against the wall, his voice sinking caressingly low. “Did you miss me?”

  I hesitated. “Of course. Was the Unholy Land fun? I’ve never been, but I’ve heard there are mermaids in the Red Dead Sea. I’d love to see a mermaid. I think they’re fascinating. I’ve read so many books about them. ‘I have heard the mermaids singing, each to each. I do not think they will sing to me.’ ”

  I finished the quotation with another cough. I didn’t think mortal poetry was welcome in the unhallowed halls of the Academy.

  “The mermaids did sing to me, actually,” Nick claimed. “All it takes is a little charm.”

  “More than a little, I’m sure.”

  Nick was far too charming for my peace of mind. He was more charming devil than Prince Charming, though. I knew it didn’t mean anything.

  “If you want to see mermaids in the Unholy Land, I’ll teleport you there right now.” Nick offered me a hand, palm up. “Come with me, Sabrina.”

  I scoffed. “Seriously?”

  “Sure,” said Nick. “I want our first date to be memorable.”

  “Um …”

  His smile was invitation in motion, mouth curving, eyes dancing. If I laid my hand in his, he might whirl me off in a flurry of crimson sparks and fireworks. I was tempted, but giving in to temptation can be dangerous.

  All I knew of romantic love was Harvey’s hands, rough from work outdoors and calloused where he held his pencils and charcoals, but always touching me with infinite gentleness. With reverence, as though I were sacred and precious to him. I never doubted I was. Harvey wasn’t an exciting stranger, but I was more than willing to trade any possibility of thrills for the certainty of true love. Even now when I was troubled or scared, I wanted to run headlong into the warm safety of Harvey’s arms. The witches at the Academy couldn’t understand.

  Nothing was sacred to Nick Scratch.

  And I’d been wrong about Harvey. I’d grown up believing true love meant withstanding everything, meant never giving up on each other. If he really loved me, he wouldn’t have broken up with me. True love hadn’t been true after all.

  That didn’t mean I’d stopped loving him. I didn’t even know who I’d be if I gave up on loving Harvey. If all your life you thought you’d have one love, and that wasn’t true, then what was true?

  On the night of the Greendale Thirteen, I’d pledged my soul to Satan. In return, I’d received enough power to call hellfire up from the earth. Only three other witches had ever been able to do that. Harvey might have suggested getting back together, but how could I go to Harvey with hellfire burning in my hands? This would be too much for him, and I didn’t want to watch Harvey turn away from me again.

  I didn’t know who I was anymore, but I would have to figure it out.

  Ni
ck had come through for me when Harvey hadn’t. Maybe I’d gotten him wrong. He was a good friend. Maybe he could be more.

  My hand wavered at my side, about to lift. Nick’s eyes tracked the movement. His wicked little smile illuminated with sudden new brightness, like someone expecting a present.

  “We could go skinny-dipping in the Red Dead Sea,” he added coaxingly.

  My hand dropped.

  Nick wasn’t even capable of something resembling mortal love. He’d told me as much. I was this week’s sexy challenge to him, nothing more. There was no point trying to gather up the shattered pieces of my heart and give them to him. Harvey had hurt me enough. I didn’t want to be destroyed.

  I laughed lightly, though the laugh sounded forced, and hit Nick on the arm, the same way I would’ve hit Susie or Roz, a gesture that said: good buddy, old pal.

  “Quit kidding around, Nick.”

  For a moment the calm on Nick’s face flickered. But the next moment he was smiling with his usual nonchalance, and I knew I was right.

  There was no time to think about Nick, or Harvey either. I hadn’t left my school project at home. I’d broken glass close to New Year’s.

  “Rain check on the Red Dead Sea,” I told Nick. “I need to find my cousin.”

  I had to learn how much trouble a bad-luck spirit might be.

  Prudence Night’s life was filled with fools to ensorcel and challenges to overcome. This year alone she’d found out she wasn’t actually an orphan, but the illegitimate daughter of their High Priest, who’d never bothered to claim her. She’d been betrayed by her sisters of the heart, who dared kill a bunch of mortals without consulting Prudence. She’d almost been the victim of a cannibalistic murder plot.

  She still found time to enjoy the simple pleasures of life, such as watching her swaggering ex-boyfriend Nick get shot down by the half mortal when he asked her out on a date. Shot down? More like obliterated. It was akin to watching a broomstick sail through the night, then get abruptly reduced to a heap of falling splinters.