VIPs in the Council."
"Speaking of which, you didn't run into my dad by any chance, did you?"
Jenna shook her head. "Nope, sorry. But I overheard Vix say he would be out here in a few days."
"Vix?" I asked, doing my startled eyebrow thing.
Jenna blushed all over again, and I laughed. "Wow, does Bram know he might have to share you soon?"
"Shut up," she said, but she was still smiling. "Hey, where is Bram?"
"Saved him for you," I said, hopping off the bed and going to the closet. I fished Bram out from underneath some laundry and tossed him to
Jenna. She caught him with a smile. "Ah, Bram, how I've miss--"
Her expression changed, and I watched that pretty flush seep from her cheeks as she stared at the stuffed lion.
Or, more accurately, at the necklace around his neck.
"Where did you get this?"
"The necklace? It was a present."
"From who?" She raised her eyes to mine, and I saw real fear in them.
An uncomfortable prickling sweat broke out on the back of my neck.
"Why? What is it?"
Jenna shuddered and pushed Bram away from her. "It's a bloodstone."
I crossed the room and picked up Bram, pulling the necklace over his head.
The large flat stone looked nothing like a bloodstone. It wasn't even red.
"It's black," I said to Jenna, holding it out to her, but she scooted back against the headboard.
"That's because it's demon blood."
Everything within me went completely still. "What?"
Jenna reached into her blouse and pulled out her bloodstone. The liquid inside was pitching and rolling, like there was a storm inside the tiny capsule. "See?" she said. "There's white magic in my stone. It only reacts like that if black magic is near. And that's some seriously dark stuff, Sophie."
Her fingers were clutching her necklace so hard her knuckles were white. "It did this the day of the ball too," she said, her eyes still on the pendant in my hands. "When you got that dirt out. I should have said something then, but you seemed so happy with the dress, and I thought black magic couldn't make something so pretty."
I was barely listening to her. I was remembering that Mrs. Casnoff said no one knew how Alice had become a witch. How she had only spoken to me after Chaston was attacked, how much more alive she'd seemed after
Anna.
And Elodie's face when Alice had given her her necklace.
Elodie was with her right now.
I dropped the necklace, and the stone cracked against the corner of my desk. A drop of black liquid seeped from the crack and sizzled on the floor, leaving a small burn mark.
I was amazed at how stupid I'd been. How naive.
"Jenna, get Mrs. Casnoff and Cal. Tell them to go to the woods, to
Alice's and Lucy's graves. She'll know where that is."
"Where are you going?" she asked, but I didn't answer. I just ran--the way I had the night I'd found Chaston.
I plunged into the woods, branches scratching at my face and arms, rocks cutting my feet. I was only wearing pajama pants and a T-shirt, but I barely felt the cold. I just ran.
Because now I understood how Alice had been corporeal, how she had all that power even though she was supposed to be dead. That black magic ritual Alice had gotten caught in hadn't turned her into a witch: it had made her a demon.
You too, my mind whispered. If that's what she is, that's what you are.
CHAPTER 31
I was certain I'd find Elodie lying bleeding or maybe even dead when
I got to the cemetery. So I was shocked when I saw her standing next to
Alice, smiling as she faded away--only to reappear seconds later about a yard away.
She'd finally mastered the transportation spell.
Alice saw me first and lifted her hand in greeting. I stared at her and wondered how I'd ever believed she was just another ghost. None of the ghosts at Hecate had ever looked so real, so whole. Life radiated from her. I felt stupid for not seeing it before.
I neared them, fear racing through me. Elodie had stopped smiling the instant she saw me and was now looking somewhere over my head.
"Elodie," I said in what I'd meant to be a calm voice, but I know I sounded as strained and scared as I felt. "I think we should go back to the school. Mrs. Casnoff is looking for you."
"No she's not," Elodie answered. She reached down into her blouse and pulled out her necklace. "It glows whenever someone's looking for me, and tells me who it is. See?" The pendent was glowing, and I could make out my own name etched across it in dull gold.
"Family heirloom, huh?" I asked Alice.
She smiled, but I saw something flicker in her eyes. "Now, Sophia, don't be jealous."
"I'm not jealous," I said too quickly. "I just think Elodie and I should head back to the school now."
Mentally, I was calculating how long it would take Mrs. Casnoff and, I hoped, Cal to get out here. If Jenna had found them right after I'd left, surely they were only a few minutes behind me.
Alice frowned and lifted her head, sniffing the air--there was nothing even remotely human in the gesture. I felt myself start to shake.
"You're frightened, Sophia," she said. "Why on earth would you be afraid of me?"
"I'm not," I replied, but again my voice gave me away.
The wind blew through the trees, making them creak against each other and sending strange shadows skittering across the ground. Alice turned her head and took a deep breath. This time her expression hardened. "You've brought intruders on us. Why would you do such a thing, Sophia?"
She flicked her hands toward the woods, and I could hear a loud groaning, like the trees were uprooting themselves and moving. She was slowing Mrs. Casnoff and Cal down, I realized with horror.
"You led Casnoff here?" Elodie asked, but my eyes were locked on
Alice.
"I know what you are," I said, my voice little more than a whisper. I'd expected Alice to look surprised or at least angry, but she just smiled again.
Somehow, that was much scarier.
"Do you indeed?" she asked.
"A demon."
She laughed, a low throaty sound, and her eyes flashed a reddish-
purple.
I turned to Elodie. She looked guilty, but she didn't flinch from my gaze.
"You did summon a demon," I said, and she nodded, like I'd just accused her of dyeing her hair, or something equally innocuous.
"We had no choice," she insisted. "You heard what Mrs. Casnoff said: our enemies are getting stronger all the time. I mean, my God, Sophie, they turned one of ours and used him against us. We had to be prepared."
She said all of this in the patient tone of a kindergarten teacher.
"So what?" I asked, my voice shaking. "You let her kill Holly?"
Now her eyes dropped, and she said, "A blood sacrifice is the only way to bind a demon to you."
I wanted to run at her, hit her, scream, but I was frozen in place.
Elodie looked at me with wide, begging eyes.
"We didn't mean to kill Holly. We knew we needed four to hold the demon and make it do our bidding. But we had to have blood. So I did a sleeping spell on her and Chaston pierced her neck with a dagger. We thought we could stop the bleeding before it was too late, but she just bled so much."
I could taste bile at the back of my throat. "You could have taken blood from anywhere," I said. "You took it from her throat so you could blame Jenna for it. Kill two birds with one stone, huh?"
I went on. "You knew that you killed Holly, but you let everyone think it was Jenna. You made me wonder if it had been her."
"I thought it was her who attacked Chaston and Anna," Elodie said, a tear trickling down her cheek. "We just thought the ritual had backfired. I never saw Alice before that night with you, I swear."
Now I looked at Alice. "Why didn't you appear to them?
Alice shrugged. "They weren't worth my ti
me. They pulled me out of hell, but I felt no need to serve three schoolgirls."
She lifted one hand, and Elodie jerked.
"I wondered why it took you so long to figure it out," Alice said, still looking at me. "You're supposed to be such a bright girl, Sophie, and yet you couldn't tell the difference between a ghost and a demon? Or was it more?"
She turned her hand a little to the left, and Elodie screamed as she flew to the side, landing in a heap against the graveyard fence. She lay still after that, but I didn't know if she'd been knocked out or if Alice was using magic to keep her from moving.
"Do you know what I think, Sophia? I think you knew what I was but you didn't want to face it. Because if I'm a demon, then what does that make you?"
My whole body was trembling now. I wanted to cover my ears to block out what she was saying. Because she was right. I'd known there was something off about her, but I hadn't wanted to question it because I'd liked her. I'd liked the power she'd given me.
"I've waited for you for so long, Sophia," Alice said, and now she looked like she always did--just a girl my age. "When those pathetic excuses for dark witches did their summoning spell, I clawed my way over a horde of demons to be the one brought forth. In the hopes that I could find you."
Blood was rushing in my ears, pounding at my temples.
"But why?" I whispered through chattering teeth.
Her smile was beautiful and terrible. Her eyes glowed as bright as a furnace. "Because we're family."
Then I was flung backward, my back slamming painfully against a tree, the bark scraping me through my shirt. I tried to move, but my limbs were heavy and useless.
"I apologize for that," she said, moving toward Elodie, "but I can't have you in the way just now."
She knelt beside Elodie while I sat helpless and paralyzed. As gently as a mother with a baby, Alice lifted Elodie's head into her lap. Her eyes unfocused and half shut, Elodie rolled her head to one side as Alice stroked her temple. Then Alice lifted her hand to Elodie's neck. Two thin claws shot from her fingertips, illuminated by the light from the orb.
Elodie barely flinched as the claws punctured her neck, but I screamed. When Alice lowered her mouth to drink, I shut my eyes.
I didn't know how much time had passed before I could suddenly move again--but when I finally stood, Alice was standing in front of me, and
Elodie lay, very pale and very still, against the cemetery gates.
I ran to her, and Alice didn't try to stop me.
Kneeling at Elodie's side, I felt the damp earth beneath us. Elodie's face was cool under mine, but her eyes were still half open, and I could hear her shallow breathing.
The wounds at her neck were red and raw, the rest of her very white.
Our eyes met and her lips moved, like she was trying to say something.
"I'm sorry," I whispered. "I'm so sorry, for everything."
She blinked once, and her lips moved again. Hand.
Thinking she wanted me to hold her hand, I reached down and took her left hand in mine.
She gave a deep sigh, and I felt a low vibration, like a low voltage current.
I felt her magic settle over me, just like she'd described. It felt soft and cold, like snow. Then her hand slipped from mine, and she went very still.
I heard Alice laugh. I turned to see her twirling in a circle, her skirt held out to her sides. "I must say, of all the gifts you could have given me, that one was the best."
Slowly, I rose to my feet. "Gift?"
Alice stopped twirling, but she was still giggling. "That night you brought her with you, I was sure you had figured out what I really was. It was kind of you to bring her to me and save me the risk of getting caught in that horrid school."
The magic Elodie had passed on to me still thrummed in my veins, but
I had no idea what to do with it. I knew I was no match for Alice, even if we did share the same type of power. She'd had a lot longer to use it, plus I guessed her stint in hell had taught her a few tricks. So the only thing I had going for me were the few paragraphs I could remember from the demon books I'd read, and pure, clean rage.
Alice was laughing again, magic drunk on Elodie's blood. "Now that
I've regained my full strength, we'll be unstoppable, Sophia. Nothing will be out of our reach."
But I wasn't listening to her. I was looking at the statue of the angel and the black sword in its hands. Black rock.
Demonglass.
In Defense, the Vandy was always going on about how everyone had a weakness, and I knew what Alice's was.
Me.
"Break," I murmured, and with a loud crack, the sword split in half.
The jagged stone landed in the grass just in front of me. I picked it up even as it burned hot and its edges sliced my hand. It was heavier than I'd thought it would be, and I hoped I'd be able to lift it high enough to do what I had to.
Alice turned around and saw me holding the shard, but she didn't look scared, just confused. "What are you doing, Sophia?"
She was standing about ten feet from me. I knew that if I ran at her, she'd flick me into a tree like a bug. But she was so giddy and didn't think I'd hurt her. After all, we were family.
I closed my eyes and concentrated, calling on my own power and the magic Elodie had given me. A fierce wind whipped around me, a wind so cold that it took my breath. My blood slowed in my veins even as my heart raced. I opened my eyes to find myself directly in front of Alice.
Her eyes widened, but not with fear or surprise. With delight.
"You did it!" she said excitedly, like we were at my ballet recital.
"Yeah. I did."
And then I hefted the shard of demonglass and sliced her neck.
CHAPTER 32
"So it turns out I'm a demon," I told Jenna the next afternoon.
We were sitting in our room, or, more accurately, she was sitting. I was still in bed, where I'd been pretty much ever since Cal and Mrs. Casnoff had dragged me back to Hecate. Cal had been able to repair most of the damage done to my feet by my crazy bare-footed run through the woods, but my hand was another story.
I looked down. My left hand was fine, but the right had three long gashes across my fingers, palm, and the heel of my hand. They were puckered and angry looking, the edges of each slash a vivid purplish-red.
Cal had done the best he could to heal them, but the demonglass had done too much damage. I'd probably always have scars.
Or maybe Cal just hadn't had much magic left after trying to revive
Elodie. He and Mrs. Casnoff had come crashing into the clearing only moments after I'd cut off Alice's head and watched her body dissolve into the dirt. Cal had run to Elodie right away, but we'd all known it was already too late. Anna had told me Cal couldn't raise the dead, but he had tried that night. Only when it was obvious that Elodie was gone did he turn to me and take the blade out of my hand.
On the way back to the school, I'd been pretty out of it, but I remember Mrs. Casnoff telling me that Alice's body had been buried in the cemetery, along with a few other demons. That's why the angel had held the blade of demonglass--just in case any of them ever managed to get out.
"You people are more prepared than the Girl Scouts," I'd muttered.
Then I'd fainted.
"I always thought you were pretty evil. I just never wanted to say anything," Jenna said now. Her voice was light, but her eyes were sad when she looked down at my hand.
I'd gotten most of the story from Mrs. Casnoff that night. She hadn't lied when she'd told me that Alice had been changed through a black magic ritual. She'd just neglected to tell me that Alice's ritual had been a summoning incantation, designed to bring forth a demon and make it do your bidding.
I had no idea what anyone would ever need a demon for. Errands?
General evil tasks that needed doing around the house?
But demons are tricky, and so instead of becoming Alice's do-boy, it had stolen her soul and made her a monster.
Since she was pregnant at the time, her baby had been a demon too. Lucy had married a human, so Dad was half demon, making me only a quarter demon.
"But," Mrs. Casnoff had told me as Cal had tried to heal my hand, "even a diluted amount of demon blood can result in enormous power."
"Great," I'd replied, my hand on fire as Cal's white magic raced over it.
Mrs. Casnoff had known what I really was all along, of course. That's why she hadn't been able to sense Alice. She thought she was just picking up on my demon vibes.
"So what happens now?" Jenna asked, getting off of her bed to sit gingerly on the edge of mine. "What about Archer and your dad?"
I shifted, wincing as my hand bumped against my leg. "I haven't heard anything about Archer other than what you told me about how he and his family have dropped off the face of the earth. Apparently there's a big group of warlocks out hunting for him."
And what they would do when they caught him. . . ? I didn't want to think about it.
"Cal thinks he and his family probably ran to Italy," I continued, trying to ignore the pain in my heart. "Since that's where The Eye is based, it seems like a safe bet."
To my surprise, Jenna shook her head. "I don't know. Something I overheard in Savannah. A few witches were talking about the L'Occhio di
Dio contingent in London. There've been a few sightings of a new guy with them. Dark-haired, young. Could be him."
My chest constricted.
"Why would he go there? He'd be right under the Council's noses."
She shrugged. "Hiding in plain sight? I just hope they catch him. I hope they catch all of them." Her eyes were cold as she said it, and a little shudder ran through me.
"As for my dad, I don't really know. The Council always knew he was half demon, but I guess since he'd never attempted to eat anybody's face and was super powerful to boot, they decided it was okay to make him Head, so long as no other Prodigium found out what he really was."
"And Mrs. Casnoff knew too?"
"All the teachers did. They work for the Council."
Jenna reached up and started twirling her pink streak.
"So you're not a witch," she said. It wasn't a question. Now my wince had nothing to do with my hand.
I wasn't a witch. I never had been. Mrs. Casnoff had explained that the powers of demons are so similar to those of dark witches that it's easy for a demon to "pass" as a witch, so long as she doesn't do anything crazy, like . . . well, like drinking the blood of a bunch of witches to make herself stronger.
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