Steadfast

7

ELIZABETH WALKED THROUGH THE STREETS OF CAPTIVE’S Sound—ignoring those who waved and smiled at her, knowing they would remember her smiling back anyway—until she reached the old blue Victorian house on Felicity Street. There she knocked and waited for an answer.

Nadia’s father opened the door, and this time she really did smile.

He returned the smile, but vaguely. Her protective glamours would allow him only to think of her as one of his daughter’s friends, a sweet girl with chestnut curls. “Elizabeth—that’s the name, right? Nice to see you.”

“Hi, Mr. Caldani. Can I come in?”

“Sure.” For a moment, his expression clouded; probably he was wondering why she was here in the middle of a school day. But Elizabeth knew that confusion would resolve in an instant. Her glamours would make him sure that she’d never be anyplace she wasn’t supposed to be. Mr. Caldani stepped back, allowing her to come inside. “You weren’t mixed up in that carnival business, were you? Sounds scary.”

“I saw the fire.” It had surrounded her. Elizabeth had meant for it to kill her—had meant to die for the liberation of the One Beneath. Such glorious light. “Honestly, it was kind of exciting.”

“It wouldn’t have been as exciting if you were in it, trust me. Now, what can I do for you?”

“Nadia said I could borrow her copy of Sense and Sensibility. It’s in her room, but she couldn’t get away to come here with me. Can I get it?”

“Sure. No problem.” He paused again. Was he wondering if Nadia even had a copy of that book? Elizabeth didn’t know whether it existed, nor did she care. All that mattered was that Simon overcome his natural resistance to allowing a near-stranger into his daughter’s room, even when that daughter wasn’t home. He would, of course; he couldn’t help himself. “Come on. I’ll show you the way.”

Together they went up the narrow, winding stairs, the ones illuminated by sunshine through an old stained-glass window. The house was a comfortable one, and—she could sense—it was beautiful in its ramshackle way. Elizabeth remembered when the only houses in towns had been the ones settlers built themselves, when she had lived behind paper windows, atop dirt floors. She had heard of a concept called nostalgia—a longing for how things used to be—and thought it was merely further proof that humans were fools. No one with any sense would want to go backward. You could only look ahead.

“Here you go,” Simon said as they went through a door at the top of the stairwell. “Nadia’s bedroom.”

Elizabeth smiled as she turned around. The walls were a soft, warm orange, the bedspread plain white and immaculate. Pressed flowers and leaves filled simple silver frames hung upon the walls. To anyone else, this would look like a simple, pleasant space; to her, it was a sign of an intelligent witch’s work. Orange was a color neutral to spells in a way that blue, red, black, and white weren’t; the neatness indicated a dedication to both Craft and secrecy. But the plants in the frames—that was a brilliant touch. Elizabeth lifted her delicate hand in front of the frames in turn. “Willow. White sage. Lavender. These plants are all for protection, you know.”

“Protection from what?”

“Bad dreams, for one.”

“Huh.” Mr. Caldani looked nonplussed. “Nadia’s really not the superstitious type. Let’s see. Here’s where the books live.”

The shelves were overladen with books new and used, paperback and hardback. He began searching through them, which gave Elizabeth a chance to touch her quartz ring.

Mr. Caldani muttered, “Sense and Sensibility? I’m not seeing it—but hang on. It could be anywhere in here.”

She looked at him, concentrated, and cast a spell of desire.

Light flashed in the room, though Mr. Caldani wouldn’t be able to see it. All he would be able to see—all he saw now, as he slowly turned to see her—was how beautiful Elizabeth was.

How incredibly, irresistibly beautiful.

Now he would be blinded to the fact that this was his daughter’s room, his daughter’s friend; he would only see Elizabeth’s willowy body, the perfect oval of her face, the brilliance of her eyes.

He is mine, Elizabeth thought. Nadia, your father belongs to me.

“There’s no rush to find the book,” she murmured as she stepped closer to him. “We can hang out in here for a while.”

Mr. Caldani swallowed hard. He was struggling. Fighting it. Sometimes they fought.

“Is it on this shelf, maybe?” Elizabeth stepped next to him, so close that she nearly fit in the angle between his body and the bookshelf. Her shoulder brushed against his chest.

“I—hmm. Don’t see it.”

“I’ll check down here.” She sank to her knees by his side, but Mr. Caldani immediately backed away. Elizabeth frowned. “Are you okay?”

“Yes, of course. But I, ah, have a conference call for work that starts soon, and really—you know, just get Nadia to bring it to you tomorrow at school. How’s that?”

Elizabeth hesitated, then rose. “All right.” She strolled out without a backward glance, saying nothing besides a very ordinary farewell; she pretended not to hear the strain in Mr. Caldani’s voice as he wished her a good day.

The warden-crow circled overhead as Elizabeth walked back home. She hadn’t completed her task today; the spell hadn’t been strong enough to overcome his resistance. Few men would have resisted temptation so successfully.

But there were spells that could take away any man’s will, if she needed them.

Nadia seemed to rely strongly upon her family. If she continued to complicate Elizabeth’s plans—to defy the right and natural path in front of her—then the very things Nadia relied on were the ones that would have to be crushed into oblivion.

When Elizabeth walked out the door, Simon Caldani shut it, dead-bolted it, and sank to the floor.

What the hell is happening to you? That wasn’t like him. Had never been like him. Simon had always thought guys who dated women much younger than themselves looked a little pathetic; he’d rolled his eyes when one of the other partners at his old firm brought a twenty-two-year-old date to the Christmas party. But at least twenty-two was legal, for God’s sake.

She was his daughter’s age! He’d never imagined he was even the kind of guy who could find that attractive, much less the kind who actually would. The more Simon thought about that moment upstairs, the weirder it seemed to him. Normally he’d never have let anyone in Nadia’s room without her permission, even a friend. And when he’d found himself attracted to Elizabeth, it was almost as though some kind of . . . trance had come over him, as crazy as that sounded.

The fact is, it’s been way too long since your wife left.

Simon thudded his head against the door, disgusted by himself, and sure of only one thing: He was never, ever going to be alone with that girl again.

“It’s just an experiment,” Nadia said as they waited their turn for “suicide” runs across the gym. PE was such a joy.

Verlaine didn’t look convinced. “An experiment on me.”

“Well, yeah.”

“Explain to me again why this is necessary?”

Nadia had known this would be a hard sell, but they had to do it. She needed the experimentee to be someone she knew, somebody who could be questioned thoroughly afterward without it raising too much suspicion. The only other possible candidate was Mateo, and his mind was under enough strain with the burden of the Cabot curse. So she had to get Verlaine on board.

Before she could say another word, though, the coach blew his whistle; their fifth turn was up. So she and Verlaine had to run to the first free throw line, back, half court, back, second free throw line, back—suicide runs sucked.

But as they went, Nadia managed to speak loudly enough for Verlaine to hear her over the thump and squeak of tennis shoes on the court. “I have to—try to make—Elizabeth forget stuff. Right?”

Verlaine nodded; her pale skin was already flushed red.

Panting, Nadia continued, “But I have to make sure—I can pinpoint—the spell. Make her forget first—what I want her—to forget most.”

“And this means—I have to forget something?” Verlaine said between gasps.

“Got to be—one thing—you’d like to forget. Right?”

They were on the last leg, the full-court run, and neither of them spoke until they reached the finish. As they collided with the padded back wall, Nadia scooped her sweaty hair away from her face. Verlaine said, “Could you make me forget the time I messed up at my third-grade piano recital, and the whole room went quiet while I tried to think of what to play next, and in that total silence of that crowded church, I farted louder than anybody else you ever heard in your life?”

Nadia bit her lip so she wouldn’t laugh. “I can try.”

“Then okay. Because that memory is one I could live without.”

They didn’t get a chance to try it until after school. For safety’s sake, Mateo didn’t join them; Verlaine had sensibly drawn the line at maybe forgetting how to breathe. They walked toward Swindoll Park, which was more or less back to normal now that the charred remains of the haunted house had been demolished. Verlaine hugged her 1950s satin bomber jacket more tightly around her as she sat on the steps of the bandstand. Nadia stood about a dozen feet away.

“Come on,” Verlaine called. “Let’s get this show on the road. It’s cold out here.”

“I’m so taking you to Chicago some January so you can see what real cold is,” Nadia called back. In truth, she was hesitating—unsure at the last moment.

The key to focusing a spell is choosing the most specific ingredients, while devoting your mind to precisely what you want erased, Nadia reminded herself. So. Hand on garnet charm, ingredients summoned:

Evidence of absence.

Proof of love’s existence.

Proof of love’s death.

She had to go for simple, precise examples of each one. Brief moments that had pricked her like a knife’s point—

Half of her parents’ closet, empty now that her mother’s stuff was gone.

The time she’d played hide-and-seek with three-year-old Cole and simply didn’t bother seeking him, because she was so desperate for some time alone. And then feeling so bad she’d tricked him—only for him to hug her as tight as ever before they went to bed.

Reading that email from her mother’s lawyer, the one where she’d learned Dad actually begged Mom to see their kids, and Mom ignored him—

The flash was subtle, the sort of thing that could seem like a trick of the autumn sunlight. After a moment, Verlaine blinked. “Did you do something?”

“I think so?” Nadia said. “Do you remember your third-grade piano recital?”

Verlaine frowned. “. . . I guess I must have had one.”

“You don’t remember?” When Verlaine shook her head no, Nadia clapped her hands together. “Yes. Yes! We did it! Oh, wait.” She froze. “Do you remember how to play the piano at all?”

“Nope.”

Oh, no. She’d gone too far, taken too much. Deflated, Nadia slumped against the nearest tree. “Verlaine—I’m sorry.”

“What are you talking about? I only took piano for two years. I forgot years ago how to do anything besides find middle C. After third grade I never wanted to take lessons anymore.” Verlaine shrugged. “I don’t know why. Hey, were you going to make me forget something?”

“We’re good,” Nadia said with a grin.

In Verlaine’s opinion, the Wikipedia entry on demons needed some serious editing.

It included every single mythology and folklore about demons, whether they were ancient Hebrew “hairy beings,” Greek divine spirits, pre-Islamic lesser gods, or one of those creepy things that climbed inside little kids and made their parents call an exorcist. See also: devil, fiend, ghoul.

She sighed. It wasn’t as though she expected a tab titled Real Demons, which she could click down to for the straight story, but still—there was so little information, and so much of it contradicted itself.

Of course she had checked sources beyond Wikipedia. However, it turned out that searching the internet for “real demons” was basically a shortcut to all the crazy of the world, right there on your computer screen. Verlaine now knew more than she’d ever wanted to know about various death-metal bands, wannabe Satanists, actual Satanists (who sounded much nicer than the wannabes), a fashion label, and several extremely delusional individuals. But she was no closer to knowing any more about the truth of what Asa was, or what he might be capable of.

The only authoritative sources Verlaine had on the supernatural were Nadia, whose word she trusted, and Elizabeth, whose word she didn’t trust at all but whose actions spoke for themselves. Elizabeth had summoned a demon to help her do evil; Nadia said demons were the servants of the One Beneath.

But still, if they didn’t ask to be His servants—if it was something they were created for, or got trapped into—

—if Asa was as much a victim of Elizabeth’s black magic as Verlaine was herself—

She pushed her laptop away, disgruntling her cat, Smuckers, who had been napping on the bed beside her. “Sorry, buddy.”

Why was it so hard to believe that somebody could be destined for evil? Jeremy Prasad had gotten most of the way there on his own, no possession required.

Yet it haunted her. Verlaine couldn’t shake the idea of being forced to serve something so hideous, so hateful that it would burn and crush and kill. Maybe Asa didn’t mind; maybe he enjoyed it. That might be how demons were, at least once they got . . . demonized.

As she sat cross-legged on her quilt, staring down at her glowing laptop screen, Verlaine wondered why this got to her so badly. There was no question that Asa was working for Elizabeth, even that he seemed to enjoy taunting them about it. Why should she care? Her old crush on Jeremy Prasad wasn’t that strong; she’d really only ever liked his body. Guiltily she realized she hadn’t even mourned his death. Well, he wouldn’t have mourned hers.

“Like the word enslaved on its own shouldn’t be enough,” she muttered. Slavery was evil, no matter who was in the shackles.

Then she heard a rustling in the hedge next to the house she shared with her dads. Though the sound made her ears prick up, Verlaine thought little of it; probably one of the neighborhood dogs got out again.

Then she heard it again—and louder. And that wasn’t a dog. That sounded like footsteps.

“Uncle Gary?” she called. “Uncle Dave?” Verlaine hurried from her room—but Uncle Dave had his headphones on, because apparently his World of Warcraft guild had a major raid tonight, and Uncle Gary was on the phone with his sister in Nebraska. She considered making one of them hang up, or both, but that was stupid. She’d heard footsteps, no more than that. It was legal for people to walk around in their neighborhood. Even this late at night. This close to the house.

Verlaine snapped on the outside lights. Once again, some rustling—all right, that’s enough.

She grabbed a flashlight from the hall cabinet—the big, heavy one that would hurt like hell if she swung into the side of someone’s head. Then she fished around in her purse and found her rape-whistle key chain, the one Uncle Dave made her promise to carry at all times, and stuck the whistle between her lips. Verlaine hesitated for one moment with her free hand on the doorknob, wondering if this was a good idea or not. Very not. As in, actually intensely dumb.

Either it’s nothing out there, and you need to see it’s nothing before you can go to sleep, she rationalized, or it’s some dark-magic mojo that can get you even through your walls. So you might as well go outside.

The outdoor lights shone in tight beams, which meant some places were extremely bright and others were still dark. Verlaine edged down the front walk, then toward the side of the house where she’d heard the rustling—right by her room. She swept her flashlight in front of her, but saw only the feeble brown grass. Her heart was pounding, even though it was nothing; it had to be nothing—

A hand closed over her shoulder and she gasped, the whistle falling from her lips, but then she sagged back. “Uncle Gary!”

“Honey, what are you doing? Did you hear something?”

“No. I mean, yes, but it’s probably nothing.”

“Well, let’s see.” He took the flashlight from her and stepped in front. Verlaine couldn’t help feeling amused at the thought of Uncle Gary putting himself between her and the forces of evil—if he only knew!

Then she realized he’d do it even if he did know, and she hugged him from behind. He laughed. “Now, what was that for?”

“Just for being awesome.”

When they got to the side hedge, Uncle Gary pushed some of the branches aside. “Look at that. Somebody vandalized Bradford’s little garden. Who would do that to a gnome?”

The garden gnome that usually watched over their neighbor’s vegetable patch had been torn up—no. Melted. It had melted right where it stood, like it had been exposed to some terrible heat.

She remembered Asa, and the unearthly, demonic heat that emanated from him every time he came near.

As Uncle Gary went next door to give them the bad news, Verlaine prodded the melted stuff with the toe of her shoe. Then she looked over at her house. This exact scorched spot was the very best place to see the light from her bedroom window.

Asa walked home through the dark, hands in the pockets of his black coat. He’d been playing spy for Elizabeth—tracking and observing Nadia and her closest friends, the better to learn their habits and vulnerabilities.

With Nadia and Mateo that was simple enough. But he found himself getting distracted when he watched Verlaine.

There was something about her that intrigued him.

He found himself walking home without seeing the houses around him, or the stars overhead. In his mind he saw only the silver fall of Verlaine’s hair.