A cloud drifted in front of the moon as he reached his street, casting everything into darkness. Their streetlight was still out. Seriously, couldn’t the county council fix anything? Humans were as bad as vampires. Nathan snorted at the thought.
He caught the tail end of a whisper and jerked around abruptly. He could have sworn he’d heard someone speaking. Chanting. Had the air gone unusually still? Nathan’s breath fogged in front of him, and he suddenly felt bone weary. Why now? Why did everything happen to him?
There was a flicker of white, but it vanished before he could identify it. More whispering. It could have been a voice, but it could have just been the breeze rustling through the trees.
Whatever it is, it can wait , Nathan thought. It was probably nothing. There was no movement in the shadows. Not even the neighbour’s dog. He strained his eyes, suddenly struggling to keep them open.
“Fuck it,” he whispered and turned back towards his house. It had probably just been his imagination. He was overtired, overstressed. Worrying about tomorrow. He staggered towards the house.
It was a miracle he managed to get himself inside and up to his room without waking anyone up. He was just so freaking tired. Nathan collapsed, still fully clothed, on his bed and slept.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
BEEP-BEEP-BEEP.
Nathan’s thoughts were sluggish and hazy. It took several moments for him to force his eyes open, and even longer to process what was going on.
He was in a hospital room.
What the hell?
He was hooked up to a heartrate monitor. His whole body felt heavy, fighting him as he tried to sit up. It was cold—the blankets were pathetically thin. Someone had dragged a plastic chair into the room and was fast asleep in it, wrapped in another blanket. It took him a moment to realise it was his mother.
“Mum?” he croaked. His mother jerked awake.
“Nathan?” she said. “Nathan, oh my God!”
“What happened?” His throat was dry, and he was starving.
His mother was wide-eyed and pale. Nathan had never seen her look this panicked before. Not ever.
“You—we couldn’t wake you,” Mum whispered. “Your heartrate was low. You were dead to the world. We didn’t know what to do.”
“W—what? I don’t understand.” He swallowed and added, “Can I get some water?”
“Yes, of course.” His mother jumped up and dashed out the room. She was back a minute later with a doctor in tow. Nathan barely had a moment to take stock of himself.
The doctor passed him a glass of water. “Thanks,” Nathan said hoarsely. It was Doctor Govender again.
“Nathan,” he said with a smile once Nathan had downed the water. “I’m glad to see you awake. Do you know who might have cursed you?”
“What? Why would anyone have cursed me?”
“You were in a cursed sleep,” Doctor Govender said. “I’m glad you came out of it on your own. Let’s say the fairy tales aren’t completely accurate about cursed sleeps. They tend to be nasty to break.”
“But—” Nathan's was spinning. “No one cursed me.”
“No one gave you anything, you didn’t touch anything that felt unusual, no one performed a spell around you?” he asked.
“Not recently,” Nathan said.
“Unless you count your Sahir mages,” Mum said.
“I’m pretty sure they were trying to kill me, not put me to sleep,” Nathan said. “Were Dad and Uncle Jeff affected?”
“No, only you,” his mum replied. “What about…” Her voice grew oddly tentative. “Your friend, Monica?”
“Monica wouldn’t curse me,” Nathan said immediately. He strained to remember what had happened. He’d spoken to Monica, phoned Adrian, then gone home to bed. He had the presence of mind not to mention his illicit excursion. “Besides, the last time I saw her was before that thing with the mages, and she was too busy fighting off the wards in the Vampire Council to do any cursing.”
Speaking of, he should call Monica. Maybe she could figure out what had happened.
“Is my phone here?” he asked. “What time is it, by the way?”
“Your phone’s at home,” said his mother. “I can ask Anna to bring it for you.”
“Can’t I just go home?” Nathan asked.
“Not until I’ve done a few tests,” the doctor said.
“I feel fine.”
“Nathan,” Mum said quietly, “it’s Monday night. You’ve been asleep three days.”
Nathan’s jaw dropped. “What?”
“I’m afraid so,” Doctor Govender said. “Now, if you’d just lay back, I’ll see about those tests. We need to make sure the curse has run its course.”
Nathan lay down, his mind racing. What the hell? What the actual hell?
“Mum,” he managed to say, “I think I need to speak to Monica.”
It was a mark of how worried his mother was that she didn’t immediately deny his request.
Nathan wouldn’t have thought it after sleeping for three whole days, but he was exhausted. He barely managed to get a plate of food in himself before he was asleep again. He awoke an indeterminate period of time later, aware of the fact that there were people talking in his room.
“…Couldn’t not bring her, whatever you say, Kathleen, they’re close friends.” Aunt Anna.
“…Might be the one at fault…” Mum.
“I DIDN’T CURSE NATHAN! What do you want me to do, take a vow of truthfulness?” The last one was Monica. She sounded angry and hurt. Nathan opened his eyes and sat up.
“Monica?”
“Nathan!”
There was a blur of red and then Monica was wrapped around him. She hit him on the arm and began sobbing into his hoodie.
“Hey, Monica,” Nathan croaked. “I’m alright.”
“You’re a fucking arsehole,” Monica said. “I spend more energy worrying about you than anyone else!”
“What a waste of energy.” Nathan couldn’t help but grin. He’d made Monica cry again. This had to be some kind of record.
“You’re going to kill me before I hit twenty-five!” Monica pulled back and wiped her eyes on her sleeve. Today, she had no makeup on, and her dark circles were very prominent, like bruises on her pale skin.
“I’m sorry,” Nathan said hesitantly.
“You better be,” Monica huffed. She dropped his phone into his lap. “I charged it for you.”
“Thanks.” Nathan powered up the screen. It was Tuesday, seven-thirty AM, and he had thirty-three missed calls and messages. Holy shit.
“What happened?” Monica demanded.
“I don’t know,” Nathan said. “My memory is blank. I went to sleep and apparently didn’t wake up.”
“There was no warning?”
“No. Can you tell what happened?”
“I can reverse-engineer what spell was used on you,” Monica said.
“That won’t put me to sleep again, will it?” Nathan asked in alarm.
“No.”
“Do it, then.”
“Nathan!” Aunt Anna protested.
“I trust Monica,” Nathan said. “Can you do it now?”
Monica nodded determinedly, shrugging her backpack off her shoulders. “I brought supplies,” she said. She pulled out a bowl and a tiny knife. “Cut your finger.”
“Blood, always blood.” Nathan sighed in exasperation, but he did as he was told and let a few drops of blood trickle into the bowl. Monica poured a small vial of pearlescent liquid over the blood, and immediately smoke began to rise from the bowl.
“This should tell us what magic was used on you recently,” she said. “I’m hoping the last spell will be the curse.” She had Nathan hold the bowl out to her, and then she began chanting rapidly, the same few words over and over in what Nathan thought might be Ancient Greek. It took several repeats, before finally the wispy smoke dispersed around them and an eerie whisper filled the room. It wasn’t English. The sounds ran together, elegant an
d smooth, but hard to distinguish individual words.
“What language is that?” Monica asked.
“Russian,” Nathan said.
“Well, that settles it. I don’t speak Russian, so I couldn’t have performed the spell,” Monica said.
Nathan had a sinking feeling in his stomach. “But we know a witch who does speak Russian,” he said quietly, catching Monica’s eye. “A witch who could have snuck up on me, thanks to her invisibility rune…”
“Oh, fuck,” Monica whispered. “Kseniya. Fuck.”
“She must have caught me on my way home,” Nathan said glumly. “Shit.”
“You were with one of us from the end of school on Friday until you went to bed,” said Aunt Anna suspiciously. “…Nathan?”
“No,” he muttered sheepishly. “I snuck over to see Monica—I knew you were going to ground me!” he added hastily. “I just wanted to make sure everyone was okay!”
“Unbelievable,” his mother said.
“He was only with me for like twenty minutes,” Monica said.
“And then five minutes on the phone with Adrian,” Nathan said. “After I left. Then I went home. That’s when she got me. Damn. I was too tired to realise anything was off.”
“Do rules not mean anything to you anymore?” Aunt Anna asked.
“I’m eighteen!” Nathan protested. “It wasn’t a school night. I just wanted to make sure my friends were okay.”
“You live in my house, you follow my rules,” Aunt Anna said. “If I say you’re grounded, you are grounded.”
Nathan glared at her.
“Give me your phone.”
“No,” he said.
“Nathan.”
“No,” Nathan repeated. “I need it. And I need to leave now and find out why Kseniya cursed me. Is she at your place?” he asked Monica. Monica nodded, looking pale and determined. “She has to answer me if I ask, doesn’t she?”
Monica touched the oak amulet around her neck. “Yes,” she said.
“Right,” Nathan said decisively. “Let’s go.” He threw his legs over the edge of the bed and began detaching his heartrate monitor and IV.
“You haven’t been discharged,” Aunt Anna said.
“I’m fine,” Nathan replied. “And I’m going. Excuse me,” he added, grabbing the attention of a nurse who had just poked her head in. “I’d like my discharge papers. And can you direct me to the bathroom, please?”
“I’ll get the doctor,” the nurse said, hurrying away.
“Nathan, you’ve been asleep for three days,” Aunt Anna said. “They’re not going to just let you walk out of the hospital.”
Nathan gave her a pitying look. “Pretty sure they are, actually,” he said.
Fifteen minutes later, he’d been discharged and had changed into fresh clothes. They piled into Aunt Anna’s car. She muttered under her breath about teenage boys the whole way, but she did drive them home.
“We are going to be having a long chat about your behaviour,” she warned Nathan as they made their way up the Abingdon Road. “I’m sure your parents will want to add their five cents as well.”
“Sure,” Nathan said. “But later. Drop me at Monica’s place, please.”
“Your behaviour is appalling,” his mum said.
“Please,” Nathan repeated. “This is important.”
“What makes you think you can get this girl to talk?” Aunt Anna asked.
“Uh…” Nathan had thought he had no more secrets to tell, but it suddenly occurred to him that he hadn’t told anyone about his dealings with the Witch Council. “So, there was this time I got summoned by the Witch Council?”
“You what?” Mum asked incredulously.
“Please don’t freak out… they offered me a boon because the Vampire Council kicked up a fuss that I’d been attacked by a witch on their turf. I asked them to free Kseniya, but to do that I had to kind of… take guardianship of her… which doesn’t make sense to me, either,” Nathan finished. “Because I’m not a witch, so I can’t mark people. But they accepted it, and she did, so I think she’s obliged to answer my questions…”
Aunt Anna pulled the car over outside Monica’s house. Before Nathan could reach for the door, she jammed on the child-lock. Then she turned to face him.
“I’m going to ask once,” she said. “Is there anything else we don’t know?”
“Um.” Nathan glanced at Monica, who shrugged.
“Kseniya might be involved with the Sahir?” she suggested.
“Yeah, that,” Nathan said. “I can’t think of anything else offhand.” The last few days had been pretty confusing. He didn’t really have a handle on who knew what anymore.
“Do you even understand what it means to have guardianship over a witch?” asked Aunt Anna.
“I have a sketchy understanding,” Nathan replied. “Please can we do this later?”
Aunt Anna frowned. She seemed to be weighing the situation, and Nathan fixed a sincere look on his face.
“I won’t bail. I’ll go to Monica’s and then come straight home,” he said.
“Fine,” Aunt Anna said. “I’m going to take a leap of faith this once. But only because you’ve proven that you will just sneak out again, and I don’t want you doing anything stupid. You will keep me updated of all of your movements, and if you’re not home in an hour you better have the world’s best excuse prepared, understood?”
“Thank you, Aunt Anna!”
She released the child-lock with a deep sigh. Monica and Nathan scrambled out of the car and jogged up to her house. Monica let them in.
“Is that you, Monica?” called a deep voice.
“Yeah, it’s me.”
A man stepped out of the kitchen, tall and slender with coffee-coloured skin and a shaved head. He was about in his late forties.
“Oh, hello Nathan,” he said. “I thought you were in hospital.”
“I’m better now,” Nathan said brightly. “Hi, Malcolm. Don’t worry, I won’t impose for long.”
“No problem,” Malcolm replied. “But don’t you have school?”
“I think I’m going to be a bit late,” Nathan said wryly.
Monica was already halfway up the stairs. “Oi, come on,” she called. Nathan waved to Malcolm Lefebvre and hurried upstairs after his friend. Monica knocked once on the guestroom door and threw it open, and Nathan was not surprised in the slightest to find it empty. There wasn’t a trace that Kseniya had even been there. The bed was neatly made. There were no personal items lying around. Kseniya hadn’t had anything, to begin with. She’d been borrowing Monica’s things.
“Fuck,” Monica said eloquently.
“Was she here when you left this morning?” Nathan asked.
“No clue. I assumed she was, but I didn’t check.” Monica looked frustrated. Nathan laid a hand on her arm.
“It’s alright, M,” he said. “We’ll solve this.” He didn’t know where this well of serenity was coming from, but he’d somehow already known Kseniya would be gone, and the same way, he somehow knew that getting angry at themselves wasn’t going to help. They’d tried that already, and it hadn’t worked.
Maybe getting three days’ sleep really had helped him get his head on straight.
“I can scry for her,” Monica said. She pushed past Nathan and hurried into her room. Nathan chased after her.
“Monica, Monica, calm down,” he said. “Take a breath. We’ll call Adrian. He might know something.” Monica ignored him, grabbing a bowl and laying candles out on her desk. Her hands were shaking, and she kept knocking things over. She tried to strike a match and snapped it clean in half.
“Fuck!”
Nathan grabbed the matches and put them on the desk. “Monica, sit.” He steered her to the bed and stood in front of her, taking her hands in his. “It’s okay.”
“No, you don’t understand!” Monica wailed. “This is my fault!”
“It’s not your fault, Monica. You couldn’t have known she was a spy.”
“Not that.” Monica sniffed loudly. “It’s my fault she fell in with the Sahir in the first place. If I hadn’t—” The rest of her sentence vanished in a torrent of tears. Nathan stared at her in alarm.
“Monica,” he said soothingly, “Monica, it’s okay. Shh. It’s okay.”
“It’s not,” Monica sobbed. “This was never supposed to happen!”
Nathan shifted to sit beside her and put his arm around her shoulders, pulling her against his chest. It was an awkward position. Monica clung to him, and he rubbed her back. It took her a few minutes to collect herself. Once Nathan thought she was calm, he said, “Monica, Kseniya did this herself. You can’t take responsibility for her actions.”
“When we were fifteen,” Monica mumbled, not moving her face away from his chest, “she was… my first, I guess.”
“First?” And then it clicked. Nathan tried to avoid talking about sex with Monica, because she made no effort to hide that she’d slept around a lot, and she loved to tease Nathan about how inexperienced he was. “Really?”
Monica nodded.
“I was with her before… before my parents died. She was, I dunno, exotic. Hot. Exciting. My parents hated it, we argued so much. Then they were dead, and I was… lost. Kseniya knew a spell, old magic, Russian magic. Banned by the Council.”
“To avenge your parents?” Nathan asked. Witches could place curses—Kseniya’s sleeping curse didn’t even come close to the full spectrum of vengeful magics that a witch could cast.
“No,” Monica muttered, “to bring them back.”
“Oh, shit.”
“Necromancy is super dangerous,” Monica said. “Pretty impossible, as well, zombies are like the closest you can get. Kseniya’s spell, though… it could have worked. If we’d done it. Probably a good thing we didn’t… spells like that often rebound on the caster. A soul for a soul…”
“You’d have died to bring your parents back?” Nathan asked in horror. He felt as though a hand had reached into his chest and was squeezing his heart. He couldn’t imagine a world without Monica.
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