I say, rather pompously, “Of course, Gabriel, they’re yours and I must give them to you, just as Van should return the Fairborn to me, as it is mine.”
Van smiles, still serene. “Yours? You stole it from Clay. In fact, Rose stole it.”
“And it was stolen by Hunters from Massimo, my great-grandfather. It belongs to my family.”
She sips her tea and then says to Nesbitt, “Do you think we should give him the Fairborn? After all, you retrieved it.”
Nesbitt bares his teeth like a bad dog and shakes his head once.
“I have to agree with Nesbitt. You were rather careless with it the first time. If Nesbitt could take it from you . . . well, a child could. It needs to be kept in a safe place. It’s a dangerous and powerful object. For the moment, I think I’ll look after it.”
“It’s mine!”
“Actually, my darling boy”—Van looks at me and her eyes sparkle in a dramatically blue haze—“I agree with you. However—and I mean this in the kindest way possible—I don’t think you should have it. Not yet. It’s an unpleasant thing, full of evil magic. I can assure you I will keep it safe.” She reaches for the teapot. “More tea?”
No one answers. As she pours she says, “Nathan, the letters are Gabriel’s. Do return them to him, please.”
I look at Gabriel and he nods.
The Amulet
Gabriel opens the tin, flicks through the letters, and takes one out from the middle of the pile. It has a smudge of soot on it from when I first went through them months ago, when I found the tin hidden in the chimney in the apartment in Geneva.
Gabriel puts this letter on the table between himself and Van, saying, “The amulet. It’s yours. Thank you. I’d be dead without you.” He opens the folds of the letter and we all lean forward to look.
Van says, “Thank you, Gabriel. It really is beautiful.”
I move closer still. I’m not sure beautiful is how I’d describe it. It’s a fragment of parchment, yellowed, with faded black-ink markings on it—writing, but not like any I’ve seen before. This is laid out in a series of circles. Only there are no full circles, just semicircles, because the parchment is ripped in half.
“What did your mother tell you about this?” Van asks.
“Not much. She thought it might have some value because of its age. She told me her grandmother found it in an old house in Berlin. By ‘found’ she meant her grandmother stole it. But that’s all she knew.”
“Did she know where the other half was?”
“No, this is all we ever had.”
“And Mercury never saw it? You never told her what it was?”
Gabriel shrugs. “I didn’t tell her it was ripped in half. I thought she wouldn’t be interested if she knew that. I told her I had an amulet that my mother had given me, that it was old and valuable. She didn’t ask any more about it, I supposed because there are quite a few like it.”
“There are quite a few amulets, that’s certainly true, and most are poor magic. I think it was lucky for me that you didn’t describe it. In fact, I suspect it was lucky for you too. I think Mercury would know what this is and she’d have killed you for just this half.” Van folds the amulet back into the paper with great care and slides it into her jacket pocket.
“Why?” Gabriel asks. “What’s so special about it?”
Van turns to Nesbitt. “I think we need champagne, don’t you? I’m sure there’ll be a wonderful selection in the cellar.” She smiles at Gabriel. “Or would you boys prefer to stick to tea?”
*
Later Gabriel and I are alone together in his bedroom. We’ve both drunk champagne. I don’t understand why I was drinking and what I was supposed to be celebrating and I didn’t really like it. I’ve never had champagne before, never drunk any alcohol before. Gabriel and Van talked about it as they would discuss a good book.