I didn’t want power over Rohan, I just wanted to save him. “What Ro doesn’t know won’t hurt him. He won’t know, correct?”
“Neither of you will be aware of me. To be clear, you’re offering one night with Rohan in exchange for the name of whoever is behind the purple magic and the return of his Rasha magic. That’s the agreement.”
“The purple magic on all three items and no using black magic to fix him. The deal is off then.” I pulled the gogota finger, the yaksas horn, and the shedim’s ear out of my purse, arranging them on the wooden bench between us.
Lilith picked up the items, curling her fingers lightly over them, staring out at the freighters far out on the water. She handed me back the gogota finger and horn. “The witch who did this is dead. She is of no importance.”
Tessa. This was the definitive connection between Prague and Askuchar, between the Brotherhood and a witch able to bind demons to do her bidding, but there was no surge of sweet triumph. “How about the ear?”
She turned it over and over in her hand, caressing its ridges. Super creepy. “I know this magic. No, something close.” She sniffed the leathery ear. “Millicent,” she sighed.
Millicent? It took me a moment to remember where I’d heard that name. “The witch who practiced black magic? She’s dead.” I looked at my companion. “Isn’t she?”
“She is,” she said sorrowfully. “This isn’t her magic. But similar.”
“Sister? Daughter?” I held out my hand for the ear, dropping it in my purse with the other items.
“Daughter. Yes. The one she gave up.”
Leo might be able to help me search adoption records, except she was hiding. I hoped. “Got a last name for Millicent? Her daughter’s name? Anything useful?”
She shrugged, like she’d lost interest. “She was white; the father was black. Her family didn’t allow her to keep the child.”
My latte hit the ground. “How old would this kid be now?”
“Thirties?”
Sienna was in her thirties. Brotherhood-hating Sienna who had been furious to learn about Ferdinand and was very upset the last time I’d seen her. Around the time of Tessa’s death. It had to be.
“We need to formalize our deal.” Lilith took my hand, scoring her thumb across it. My palm split, drops of blood welling up.
“Wait.” You’re doing this for his magic. He’ll never know and it’s still me that he’ll be with. It’ll merely be like someone watching us. “You swear it’s only one time.”
“Yes. Tonight.”
“He’ll just have gotten his magic back. He may not be in the mood.”
“Then convince him.” She cut her own hand open and pressed our skin together. I repeated the words of my vow to uphold the oath. Our gashes sizzled, scabbing over like a pink, twisted burn. “It’ll fade once the deal is completed.”
There’d be no mark save for the blemish on my psyche. “Can you get through the wards?” I said.
“I don’t need to. I’ll be in you, and you can cross them no problem.”
No problem. What a joke. Ro lived by the code that you didn’t betray your team, and in making the deal with Lilith I’d done just that. It didn’t matter that the ends justified the means, because if I didn’t save him this way, I’d lose him. It didn’t matter that he’d never know what I’d done.
I’d know, and I hated myself already.
Lilith sashayed to my car, throwing coy smiles at all the turned heads.
I clutched my purse strap so I wouldn’t clock her.
She slid into the front seat and, pulling down my visor, applied some lipstick she had stashed in her bra.
“You said he wasn’t going to see you.” I wrenched the engine on, grinding it. It went well with the still-dented hood.
“I want to look my best for me. Now, let’s see what we’re working with.” She pumped my arm up and down.
“What the hell are you doing?”
“Do you have to know every little detail?”
“Uh, yeah.” I tried to swat her hand away but she swatted me right back.
“You have a bit of healing magic, but it’s weak. No one trained you?”
“No one knew I was a witch. How did you?”
“Who’d ever heard of a female Rasha?” She kept pumping my arm.
I squirmed, checking that no one was staring in through the windows at us. “This is ridiculous.”
“I’m priming the magic up for one good shot. You want your boyfriend fixed, don’t you?”
“Yes, but there’s no way you’re really doing anything.”
“Ye of little faith.” She pumped my arm one last time.
“Ye of big bullshit. This doesn’t work, our deal is off.”
“Be careful when you release it. There’s a bit of a kicker on this.”
“Fucking hell.” What a joke.
She brushed off her hands. “Don’t say I didn’t warn you. Ready?”
I snapped my seatbelt in. “As I’ll ever be.”
One second she was there, the next she wasn’t. A feather-light touch skimmed my shoulder blades, my skin stretching like the not-unpleasant sensation of flexing my fingers with tight, dry skin and that, apparently, was that.
I searched my eyes in the rearview mirror but there was no sign of her. Nothing about me looked different, nothing felt different, yet driving home, my fingers twitched, itching to claw off my own skin, find her, and rip her out.
I called Dr. Gelman over Bluetooth. “Sienna’s taken over from Tessa.”
“You’re doing wonders for my recovery. Would you like to come over and throw some nuclear waste on me?”
“Sienna is your friend. Did you know she was Millicent’s daughter?”
“Bat zona!” A long drawn out pause, followed by a flick, and a deep inhale.
“Are you smoking?! Put that out!”
“One drag. Rivka,” she called. There followed a fast and furious conversation in Hebrew and I was put on hold.
I scrolled through the dial: Paula Abdul’s “Cold-Hearted Snake,” Bon Jovi’s “You Give Love A Bad Name,” and “Burn” from Hamilton. I punched off the radio.
“Sienna’s cell is out of service,” Gelman said. “My ward nurse said that she up and quit suddenly after seven years on the job.”
“Could Sienna take over from Tessa? Binding demons?”
“She would have had to be training in secret for years, but that’s how it works, isn’t it?” Her lighter clicked on and off. “Working for the Brotherhood, however? Tessa may have been charmed into it by Ferdinand, but Sienna? No. Whatever she’s up to, she’s not helping them.”
“Did she kill Tessa for it?”
“No. That was the magic.” She said it with absolute certainty.
I pulled up the chapter house gate, expecting alarms to blare, and my flesh to boil when I passed the ward line onto the property. I crossed my fingers, hoping for the out, and gunned forward. There was no bouncing off the invisible shields, just a smooth slide onto the grounds.
“How’s Rohan?” Dr. Gelman asked.
“He’ll be fine.” Help me. I coughed.
“Are you all right?”
“Fabulous. Gotta go.” There’d be no help for what I’d done, but I could fix what was broken.
Unless Ro and Drio, sparring in the Vault, killed each other first.