She tosses her head and laughs again, and the heat of my magic surges up into my chest.
“You?” she says, pointing at me. “Are threatening me? You forget I’ve been a witch for a lot longer than you, honey. Not a smart move.”
The heat stings my fingertips, growing hotter and hotter until it’s almost unbearable. “Get out,” I repeat.
“You’re the crazy one,” she says. “Look at you. What are you gonna do, huh? Attack me? I’ve seen your skills before, and trust me, they’re not that impressive.”
“Get. Out.”
“Screw you,” she says darkly. “You couldn’t stop the Priory when your own mother’s life was at risk. What makes you think you can stop me if I wanted to hurt you now?”
I don’t think before I act. All the anger overwhelms me, and I just want to hurt her. I hold out both my hands, and a blast of wind shoots from them, so powerful I can see the air currents. It rocks Jezebel back off her feet and she almost smashes into the window. Almost. She disappears before that can happen.
Vanishes into thin air.
3
I sit at the kitchen table, mechanically eating a bowl of Cocoa Puffs even though I’m not remotely hungry. I feel like a bad person eating a bowl of cereal when my best friend is who knows where, suffering who knows what, and all because of me. But I’ve been getting brutal headaches lately, and Bishop says it’s probably from malnourishment. I’d accused him of being dramatic, but truthfully, he’s probably not far off the mark.
I can’t stop thinking about what I did to Jezebel last night. Almost did, I remind myself. I mean, sure, Jezebel’s a bitch and her plan was crazy with a capital K, but I really wanted to hurt her. Who knows what I would have done if she hadn’t made herself disappear?
“Don’t look so pissy,” Aunt Penny says, pulling out a chair and slumping down across from me. She’s still in her fluffy pink bathrobe, and her blond hair is pulled up in a messy bun on top of her head.
“Trust me,” she says, noticing the direction of my stare. “I don’t want to be up this early either.”
I look down into my cereal. If she thinks one little apology is all it takes for me to forgive her, then she’s been watching a few too many Lifetime Originals.
Aunt Penny turns on the TV on the kitchen counter and flicks through the channels, pausing on the news.
“…was last seen leaving school on Friday afternoon. Efforts to reach him via phone and social networking sites have been unsuccessful. His parents say this is out of character for Josh, and are asking the public to help search for the missing teen.”
“Know him?” Aunt Penny asks, nodding at the TV.
On the bottom of the screen is a photo of a boy with bright blue eyes, scruffy red hair, and a smattering of freckles across his cheeks. He’s wearing a baggy sweatshirt and scowling at the camera.
“Nope,” I say, slurping up the last of my milk. I take my bowl over to the sink and give it a quick wash.
“I’m going to need you to work at the shop for a bit tonight,” Aunt Penny says as I dry the bowl.
“What?” I whirl around, tea towel still in hand.
“I have a meeting with the bank at four. House stuff. It’s really important or I wouldn’t ask.”
Must stay calm. Must not explode.
“It’ll be for only a few hours at most,” she adds.
I’m about to tell her where to shove her bank meeting when I realize that she’s providing me with both the perfect place to perform the locating ceremony and a chunk of unsupervised time.
“Fine,” I grumble. I chuck the tea towel into the sink for effect and grab my messenger bag.
“Come straight after school!” she calls to my back as I fly out of the front door into the bright morning sunshine.
I’ve never been particularly excited to go to school, despite managing straight As in all my classes (which are probably D’s after the mounds of tests and assignments I missed in the sixteen days I’ve been absent), but today, the prospect is especially unappealing. There are a few reasons for this.
1) Paige is missing—duh.
2) I look like I should be at home hoarding newspapers and feeding my eighteen cats. Allow me to elaborate: my hair is an Afro on a good day. Without time to blow it out this morning, it’s an absolute nest of snarly blond curls and I wouldn’t be surprised if an actual bird had made a home in there. I’m also still sporting dark shadows under my eyes that not even Aunt Penny’s Hollywood makeup artistry could conceal, and I’m all too aware that the shirt I grabbed off the back of my chair has a jam stain, which I have to use the strap of my bag to conceal.
And lastly,
3) I have to face Bianca and the rest of the people who saw Bishop and me being chased by the dragon that Leo and his goons sent after us the night of homecoming. Despite all signs pointing to their memories of the incident having been wiped clean, I’m still nervous to see everyone for the first time.
And the worst part? I have to do it alone. I briefly tossed around the idea of begging Aunt Penny to consider home-schooling until I realized QT with my aunt would be more painful than school.
I park my Sunfire, then take a quick glance in the rearview mirror. I shudder and make a mental note to avoid any reflective surfaces for the rest of the day.
The hallways are a din of voices, laughter, and the metallic sound of lockers slamming closed. A massive blue and silver banner strung across the hall proudly proclaims Fairfield as the winner of the annual homecoming game against Beverly Hills High—Go Renegades—and members of the football team engage in a wrestling match, which Mrs. Hornby tries to break up as a crowd calls out bets on the winner.
For a split second, it’s comforting, the familiarity of the place. I start to feel like, hey, maybe the world hasn’t tipped off its axis. But in that same split second I remember that—no—everything isn’t normal, Paige isn’t here, and then I’m angry with myself for deigning to think anything could be okay when it’s so, so not.