“This isn’t Uncle Barnabas,” she said. “I don’t know who you are, but our real uncle came to the Cottage last week to help look for Prosper. The whole family did.”
“That’s…impossible,” I said, turning toward him. He leaned casually against the door, his arms crossed over his chest. Slacks and a loose button-down shirt—it was the nicest I had ever seen him look.
I warned you! Al roared. I told you not to trust them!
Why had I? It seemed enough at the time that he’d saved me, but then he’d shown me the letter from Dad…
And Missy had shown me how easily handwriting could be copied with a single spell.
Bile rose in my throat, burning.
“This is very unfortunate,” he said. “This ruse would have been easier to keep up if the idiot had stayed in Las Vegas where he belonged. I suppose now is as good of a time as any to get things started. Cornelia, if you wouldn’t mind…?”
Nell looked like she wanted the floor to swallow her whole. She sat beside the cauldron that was steadily bubbling in the middle of the room. Around her were empty vials, the body of a dead eel…
Three toes of a man hanged for his crimes, a newborn eel’s freely given slime, wings of a black beetle plucked midflight, two eggs of a viper stolen at night, a gleaming stone cast down from the moon, all boiled in a cauldron at high noon… The spell. Nell had started the spell, likely before we ever left school on Monday. If she’d had the key to the room, if she had reinforced it through enchantment, hardly anyone would have been able to disturb it.
“Who are you?” I demanded. “Answer me!”
“Typical. A Redding shouting and stomping around to get his way.” The man I knew as Uncle Barnabas kicked himself off the wall. He gave a little sarcastic bow. “The name’s Henry Bellegrave. My daughter and I are here to take back everything your family took from ours.”
For a second, it was like my brain forgot how to work. Dark fuzz was crowding in on my vision, and I felt both dizzy and sick at the same time. I didn’t snap out of it until I felt Prue’s hand reach back to push me behind her. To protect me.
Not this time, I thought, stepping forward.
“You’re a Bellegrave?” I asked Nell. My brain finally put together all of the little clues. I really was an idiot.
“No, I’m a Bishop,” Nell said. “He…I never met him until my mom died.”
“It was a fortuitous turn of events,” Henry said. “I knew Cornelia’s mother had…talents. I sought her out when I was doing my research for my PhD, lived with her, studied her. She herself had studied Goody Prufrock, and had shared the ingredients necessary for Prufrock’s spell. But I needed the incantation, the words she spoke, in order to complete it. I left to do my own research, and, over a decade later, heard rumors that dear Tabitha had found a record of the incantation. By the time I returned to Salem for it, Tabitha had oh-so-sadly passed and her grimoire, where she kept all of her notes, was conveniently missing, but lo and behold, here was a daughter I never knew I had, just waiting for me. And she was talented, like her mother.”
Nell turned back toward me, her voice breaking. “I couldn’t…Prosper, they said if I helped them, I could have my mother back. The malefactor he contracted with would free her from the shade realm.”
Oh, Alastor said. Oh, these weak human hearts.
What do you mean?
Tell Mistress Cornelia she has been lied to. The realm of shades can be opened, but not without throwing off the balance of life. Worse, it would not be her mother that returned to her. It would be a shade of her mother, a hungry ghoul who would haunt her forevermore. Tell her!
“They lied to you,” I said. “Nell, I’m sorry, but it’s not possible. Al says—”
“I don’t care what he says!” she shouted. “They said I could have my mom back! Missy wouldn’t help, and I couldn’t do it alone. They promised! You have to understand!”
“Yeah, I understand all right,” I said. “You really are a great actress. You had me stupidly believing we were friends.”
“You were never friends,” Prue cut in, giving the other girl a look like Death itself. “They interrupted Grandmother in the middle of the ceremony to help you.”
“How is trying to stab me with a knife helping me?”
“She had to cut each of your limbs to make sure the fiend couldn’t control them or fight back—then she was going to finish the spell that witch—Goody Prufrock—started.”
Wow. Okay.
“If that was her intention, then she’s a bigger fool than I thought,” Uncle—Henry Bellegrave said with a sharp laugh. “The intention of the original spell was to seal the malefactor inside of the servant girl, but it was also meant to strip him of his power and pass it to another. Of course, our friend Alastor cursed himself before that could happen and here we all are.”
I understand now, Al said, sounding more furious than before. If I hadn’t done what I did that night, my brother would have stolen my powers and rendered me mortal. The flames would have taken care of the rest.
“Start, Cornelia,” Henry barked. “Now.”
I stared at her as she came and picked up her mother’s grimoire. Prue and I both tried to dive for it, but Nell threw us back against the wall with a wave of her hand.
Let me help you. I can get us out of this.
I don’t want your help, I said, suddenly too angry to see straight. All of this, every single bit of this, was his fault. None of this would be happening—the attacks, the kidnappings, making me feel like I belonged here. My hands tightened into fists at my side. I couldn’t hear the words that Nell was murmuring over the pounding blood in my ears.
Now, Prosper, NOW! She’s summoning my brother—she’ll bring him through and then it will all be for nothing. He will kill you to kill me!
Prue screamed my name as I launched forward, knocking candles over and spraying hot wax everywhere. Henry knew what he was doing, though. He had his arm locked around my throat, and one of mine pinned at a painful angle behind my back.
I can get us out of this! Take the iron bracelets off! TAKE THEM OFF!
“Watch now, malefactor,” Henry whispered in my ear. “I’ve made a contract of my own. Everything you helped the Reddings take from my ancestors will be mine once more.”
He pointed me toward the nearest mirror and held me there. Prue took a step forward, raising her fist. All Henry had to do was twist my arm and get me to scream for her to back off.
“Dude,” I said, struggling to pull away. “Get over it! It’s been three hundred freaking years!”
“And yet I live with the consequences every day!” he said. “Of what your ancestors did! It’s a miracle that I’m here today.”
Yes, Al agreed. Clearly I didn’t do as thorough a job as I thought. I wonder which Bellegrave escaped the colony before I got my claws into him?
The floor shook under our feet—one solid pound, and then another, and another.
Oh, Al said simply, crap.
“What was that?” I heard someone say outside the door. “Did you feel that?”