Текст книги "Changeling"

Автор книги: Cate Tiernan

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I nodded, unable to speak. God, I hated not being in his life like I had been. I wanted to comfort him, to tell him it would be okay, but now I was the person who was causing part of the pain.

“It’s cold,” he said unnecessarily. “Why are we out here? Let’s go in.” He moved toward the door, but I held up my hand.

“No.” I said.

“Why?” His perfect brows arched over eyes as green as sea glass. All I wanted was for him to hold me and comfort me and tell me everything was going to be all right.

“Remember, I told you about my folks going on a cruise? They left today.”

“Where’s Mary K.?”

“Jaycee’s.”

His face took a speculative expression, and I braced myself.

“You’re saying you are alone in the house,” he said.

“Yes.”

“That cruise was for… eleven days?”

“Yes.” I sighed.

“So you’re alone in the house. All by yourself.”

“Yes.” I couldn’t look at him—his voice was softened, and the anger was gone. Oh, Goddess, he was so attractive to me. Everything in me responded to him.

“So let’s go in.” He sounded much calmer then when he had arrived.

I almost whimpered from wanting him. If he came in the house, if we were alone together, how could I keep my hands off him? How could I stop him from putting his hands on me? I wouldn’t want to. And what would that do? Making out wouldn’t change anything: not my heritage, not my fears, not the possibility that I was going to end up more Ciaran’s daughter than Maeve’s.

“No, that’s not a good idea.”

“Got some other guy in there, have you?” His tone was light, but I felt tension coming off him like heat.

“No,” I said, looking at my feet. “Look, I just don’t want to be alone with you, okay?”

“Then how about my house? We wouldn’t be alone there.” Hunter lived with his cousin, Sky Eventide.

I gave him my long-suffering look. “I don’t think so. We broke up, remember?”

“We should talk about that,” he said, frowning. “Speaking of bad idea’s.”

Tell me about it, I thought. I wanted to be with Hunter more than anything. But I knew—and I had to make myself remember—how terrible it would be to hurt him later. I shook my head to clear it, trying to get back to the subject at hand.

“We should talk about your trying to control the decisions I make.”

Hunter frowned as he seemed to remember why he had come. “I’m not trying to control your decision,” he said. “I’m trying to help you not make irresponsible ones.”

“You think I’m irresponsible?”

“You know I don’t. I think you made this decision without having all the facts. Like about exactly how dangerous Ciaran and Amyranth can be. How many deaths they’re responsible for. How much power and knowledge they have at their disposal. Pitted against you, a seventeen-year-old uninitiated witch who’s been studying Wicca for a grand total of three months.”

I knew all that, but hearing him state it so baldly made me cringe. “Yes, I know,” I said. “I still think I need to try.” I need to know if I’m good or bad, I added to myself. I need to know who my father is, what my heritage is. I need to know that I can choose good. If I don’t know these things, we can never be together.

“I don’t want you to get hurt,” he said, his voice sounding frayed. “It’s not your job to save the world.”

“I’m not trying to save the world,” I said. “Just my little part of it. I mean, today it’s Starlocket—and Alyce, remember? Tomorrow it’s us. Don’t you see that?”

Hunter looked around, thinking, deciding on another plan of approach. He was well acquainted with how stubborn I could be, and I could see him weighing his chances of getting through and changing my mind.

He pushed himself off the house and stood before me.

“Tell me the instant you hear from Killian,” he said.

I tried not to show my surprise. “Okay.”

“I don’t like this.”

“I know.”

“I hate this.”

“I know.”

“Right. So call me.”

“I will.” After he left, I went back inside, shivering with cold. I sat down in front of the fire and rested my head against the couch. I would have given a lot to have Hunter with me right then. I sighed, wondering if love was always this hard.

5. Connection

I am glad to hear your cough is better, Brother.

As I recounted, the siege (I can only call it thus) has continued against the abbey. Our poor milk cow has gone dry, our kitchen garden has withered, and the mice are keeping our one cat constantly at work. Our daily offices are ever more sparsely attended.

It is the villagers, the Wodebaynes. I know this, though I have not seen it. We are now obliged to buy milk and cheese from a neighboring farm. Various illnesses have beset us; we cannot shake colds, aches, fevers, etc. It is a desperate time, and I will resort to desperate measures.

—Brother Sinestus Tor, to Colin, may 1768

On Monday morning I saw my sister heading toward our school, followed by some of the Mary K. fan club. I waved at her.

“Mary K.!”

She trotted over, her shiny hair bouncing. I was glad to see her looking more like herself. She’d had a horrible autumn. Twice I stopped her boyfriend, Bakker Blackburn, from practically raping her. After the second time I told my parents, who lowered the boom on Mary K. I also told Bakker he’d regret being born if he ever looked at my sister again. I knew we weren’t supposed to use magick to harm, but I was absolutely ready to put some serious hurt on Bakker if he hurt Mary K.

But now Mary K. looked happy.

“Hey!” she said.

“Hi,” I said, rubbing my eyes. I’d gotten about three hours sleep total. All the little creaks and groans and windows shaking in the wind that I’d never noticed before had been magnified tremendously and made it impossible for me too sleep deeply. “Everything okay?”

“Yep! How about you?”

“Fine. Okay, um, yell if you need anything.”

“Sure—thanks.” She headed back to the gaggle of freshman friends who were waiting for her. Among them I was surprised to see Alisa Soto, who seemed to be a friend of Jaycee’s. Alisa was a sophomore who’d transferred to Widow’s Vale High around Christmas, but I had actually hardly seen her at school until today. I knew her because she was in my coven Kithic—the youngest member. She was one of the people recruited by Bree when Bree had formed a new coven to rival mine and Cal’s. When Cal was gone, our two covens had combined to form Kithic, and we were now led by Hunter and Sky.

Most of my coven went to my school: Bree Warren and Robbie Gurevitch, my two best childhood friends, who had recently become a couple; Raven Meltzer, local bad girl and resident goth, who happened to be dating Hunter’s cousin, Sky Eventide; Jenna Ruiz; Matt Adler; Ethan Sharp; and Sharon Goodfine. The last two were a couple, and Jenna and Matt had once been a couple, too, but had broken up.

I was dreading seeing my friends. I didn’t know if any of them, aside from Bree and Robbie, knew about me and Hunter. I hadn’t wanted to see them Saturday, and I still didn’t want to see them. But I had no choice.

All of them, except for Alisa, were sitting, as usual, on the back stairs that led to the school’s basement. “Morgan,” Robbie greeted me. During our New York trip Robbie had come down on me about my casual misuse of magick. We had made up, bun things weren’t totally normal yet.

“Hey.” My nod included everyone. I popped the top on the Diet Coke I’d bought on my way to school and took a deep slurp. Act casual.

“So, how’s the bachelorette pad?” Bree asked with a smile.

“Fine. My folks went on a cruise, so I’ve got the place to myself,” I explained to the others. For an instant I thought of Hunter saying, “Let’s go in,” and my heart contracted.

“Party at Morgan’s house,” Jenna said, laughing; then her laugh turned into a cough. Bree patted her on the back and looked at me. This cold, damp weather made Jenna’s asthma worse.

“No, no party,” I said, starting to wake up as the caffeine coursed through my veins. “I can’t face the cleanup job after.”

Plus Mom would have a cow, I thought.

They laughed, and Bree wrapped her arms around Robbie’s knee. He looked cautiously pleased. He was crazy about Bree she seemed to care about him, and they’d been trying to hash out some kind of relationship for a while now. During our trip to New York, they seemed to have made some degree of progress.

“Sky missed you at Saturday’s circle,” said Sharon Her black hair swung in a thick curtain just past her shoulders. It was still a little odd to see her all cozy with Ethan, who had been one of the school’s biggest potheads until he’d found Wicca. Now he was clean and sober and in love with Sharon.

Raven snorted. “Sky takes everything too seriously.” Raven and Sky had been sort of a couple for the last few weeks, but Raven’s wandering eye had gotten her into trouble more than once.

Jenna coughed again, and I winced at the sound of her rattly indrawn breath. She looked at me hopefully. I had helped her before, but now I knew that even that kind of magick was forbidden to uninitiated witches. But how could I not help a friend? It seemed so harmless. I hesitated just a minute, then scooted closer to Jenna. She sat up straighter, already anticipating being able to breathe freely again.

I closed my eyes and sank quickly into a deep meditation. I focused in a healing white light and imagined myself grabbing a ribbon of this light out of the air. Then, opening my eyes, I brought my hand to Jenna’s back and pressed my palm flat against her thin amethyst sweater. I breathed out, willing the light into Jenna, letting it flow into her lungs, feeling her constricted airways relaxing and opening, all her thirsty cells soaking up the oxygen. After just a minute I took my hand away.

“Thanks, Morgan,” Jenna said, breathing deeply. “That works so much better than my inhaler.”

“You could also wear an amber bead on a silver chain around your neck,” Matt surprised us by saying. Seven heads swiveled to look at him. Since he’d cheated on Jenna with Raven, he’d been very quiet and kept a low profile. He always came to circles, always completed the assignments Hunter gave us, but he never participated beyond what was required. He looked embarrassed by the attention. “I’ve been doing some reading,” he mumbled. “Amber is good for breathing. So’s silver.”

Jenna looked at him solemnly, at the boy she’s loved for four years until he’s betrayed her. She gave a little nod, and then the morning bell rang. Time to get to class.

I sucked down the last of my Diet Coke an pitched the can into the recycling bin. Our group split up, and Bree and I headed toward our eleventh-grade homeroom. I wished I could tell her about Eoife McNabb and Ciaran and Hunter and everything I was facing. But thought I hadn’t been officially sworn to secrecy, I knew there was too much at stake to tell anyone who wasn’t involved. Not even Bree or Robbie.

“Have you been doing any readings lately?” I asked. Bree had been studying the tarot.

“Uh-huh.” Gracefully she swung her black leather backpack onto her shoulder. Bree was gorgeous. That was the first—and sometimes the only—thing anyone noticed about her. She was taller than me, slender, with a perfect figure. No zit ever dared to mar her skin, her eyes were large, coffee colored, and expressive, and she’s been born with a gift for choosing prefect clothes and makeup. Next to her I usually looked like I ought to have a tool belt strapped around my waist.

“Alyce helped me find another book at Practical Magick that has variant readings of some of the cards. It’s so interesting, the whole history of the cards and what they’ve meant according to what time period they were being read in. It’s the first thing in Wicca that I feel I can really relate to.”

“That’s great,” I said. Bree wasn’t a blood witch, so while Wicca and magick flowed so naturally to me, it didn’t always make it to her. I was glad she’d found something that felt meaningful.

It was hard to go to classes all day, being taught subjects like calc and American history, when I was wondering if my friends were going to be killed by a dark wave soon. It made it difficult to concentrate or to take what the teacher was saying seriously. I tried to keep myself mentally in classes, but I floated through the day, my mind on other things.

I caught up with Bree on the way to the parking lot after the last bell.

“Your dad out of town again?”

“As usual. I think it’s the same women, in Connecticut. So this makes a record for him—two months with the same person.”

Since her mother had run off with a younger man when Bree was twelve, Mr. Warren really hadn’t had a serious relationship.

“How do you feel about it?” I asked. We pushed through the heavy doors, feeling the force of the cold wind smack us in the face.

“I don’t know,” said Bree. “I don’t think it would affect my life that much. Unless, God forbid, she took an interest in me.”

She pretended to shudder and I couldn’t help laughing—the first time in days.

“Oi, Morgan,” said a voice, and a chill hit me that had nothing to do with the weather. Killian, my half brother, was sitting on a stone bench at the edge of school property. Our eyes met, and he grinned at me, his attractive, somewhat feral grin. “You rang? It was you, right?”

Bree glanced at me, and I realized she didn’t know I had called Killian here. I had told her about my experiences in New York: that Ciaran was my father, Killian my half brother, and why that meant I had to break up with Hunter. Bree had been incredibly supportive over the last few days, but I knew Killian’s presence must have been a shock to her. Hell, it was a shock to me. Somehow I’d thought I would have more time to prepare. With him here, the wheels had to be set into motion, and I felt afraid.

I drew in a deep breath. “Hey, Killian,” I said. “I was hoping to talk to you again.”

“At your disposal.” He spread his arms wide. His English accent was adorable. I hadn’t seen him since I’d learned we were half siblings, and now I stared at him, trying to see some resemblance.

“Killian!” called Raven.

I groaned inwardly as she hurried over to us. In New York she had flirted with Killian hard an heavy and in front of Sky, who had not been amused. Somehow I hadn’t factored Raven into the scheme of things when I had agreed to be part of Eoife’s plan.

“Hey, baby!” she said enthusiastically, leaning down to kiss him on both cheeks. Killian looked happy to see another of him many admirers, and he pulled her down to sit next to him.

“I was nearby, thought I’d drop in,” said Killian, giving me a glance. He knew that I was a blood witch and that the others weren’t, and he seemed to be gauging what to say. Amusement lit his eyes.

“I’m so glad you did,” purred Raven. “I thought we’d never see you again.”

“Yet here I am,” he said magnanimously. He smiled at her. and thought I felt exasperated—Go away, Raven—I also couldn’t help being amused, even a little proud. Killian was definitely fun to be around—but even more, I felt a sort kinship to him. I understood his humor, and his party-guy act didn’t bother me like it did so many of the others. Maybe that’s what blood ties really felt like.

“And there you are,” he said to Bree, checking her out in a way that was so outrageous, it was funny. She gave him a skeptical smile, then turned away.

“I’m starving,” she said, turning her gaze to me. “Want to go get something to eat?”

I bit my lip. Now that Killian was here, it was time to bond with him—time to gain his trust, ask about Ciaran, and hopefully get Ciaran out here. “Um, actually…Killian and I need to catch up.”

Bree looked surprised. “Oh.” She glanced over at Killian, who seemed absorbed with Raven, and then whispered to me, “Is everything okay?”

“Yes,” I said. “I’m sorry, Bree. I just need time to talk to Killian.”

Bree nodded slowly. “You’ll be all right alone with him?” she whispered.

I nodded quickly and circled my thumb and forefinger in the “okay” sign.

Bree nodded again, but her eyes still shone with concern. “All right,” she said, loud enough for Killian and Raven to hear.

“Well, I’m going to head home. See you guys.”

“Oh, yes, you certainly will.” Killian turned and grinned suggestively, and Bree smiled in a sort of confused way as she headed off.

“Well, I’m up for anything, as always,” Killian said, standing up and turning to me so that Raven’s leg was pushed to the side.

“Though I should mention that I’m rather famished myself.”

“I know a diner we could go to.”

“Perfect!” Killian flashed his trademark grin and turned to Raven. “How about you, love? Care to join us?”

“I can’t,” Raven said, frowning. “Mom’s suing Dad again and I have to meet with the lawyers.” She rolled her eyes. “They are such losers.”

“Oh, too bad,” I said, relieved, as Killian and I headed for Das Boot. I wasn’t sure if she meant the lawyers or her parents—probably both—and I didn’t care. Killian waved behind him as we walked off.

“Cool car,” he said as he climbed in, putting his arm across the back of the bench seat. “I love huge American cars. Gasguzzlers.” He smiles. “What year?”

“Nineteen seventy-one,” I said, pulling out into the street and heading toward the highway. Despite having called him, I was still rattled by Killian’s presence, and the weight of my mission pressed in on my chest, making me feel like I had drunk a couple of double espressos. “Listen, Killian,” I added quickly, “do you know who I am?” Might as well plunge right in.

“Sure. The witch from New York. With the friends, at the club.” He slouched comfortably against the seat, unconcerned that he was in a car with a virtual stranger going to a place he didn’t know, in a town he had just shown up in. He seemed like a leaf, a colorful autumn leaf, tossed about by the wind and content to go where it took him.

I took a deep breath. “Ciaran MacEwan is your father.”

He straightened a little bit, and I felt tension entering his body. He took a longer look at me, and I felt him cast his senses towards me, trying to figure out if I was friend or foe. I blocked his scan easily, not letting him in, and saw him straighten more.

“Yeah,” he said warily. “You knew that. So?”

My throat constricted as I turned onto the access road to Highway 9. Somehow I just couldn’t get the words out, and suddenly the diner was there in front of us. I pulled in and parked, and we didn’t speak again until we had ordered.

The waitress brought our drinks. We sat across from each other in the back booth of a fifties-retro diner. Killian took the paper off his straw, stuck it in his chocolate milk shake, and sipped—all without taking his eyes off me. I watched him, unable to decide what my next move should be.

“So, what do you want with Ciaran? Is your Seeker boyfriend looking for him?” Killian finally said lightly, but his face didn’t match his voice.

I fought to hide my surprise at his question. “The Seeker is not my boyfriend,” I said, looking him in the eye. “I found out Ciaran MacEwan is my father, too.”

Killian sat back as if he’d been slapped. His eyes open wide, he scanned me again, looking at my hair, my eyes, my face.

“I realized it in New York,” I explained awkwardly. “I didn’t know until then. But—Ciaran and my mother had an affair, and my mother had me.” And they were mùirn beatha dàns, soul mates, and then Ciaran killed her. And a short while ago he tried to kill me. I wondered if Killian had any idea what had happened to me in New York. I figured the odds were against it—he had told me that he and Ciaran weren’t all that close. Appearing out of nowhere, the waitress clanked our plates onto the table in front of us. Killian and I both jumped. After she left, he continued to look at me, stroking his chin.

“What was her name?” he asked finally. “Your mother.”

“Maeve Riordan, of Belwicket.”

I might as well have said Joan of Arc or Queen Elizabeth. He stared at me as if I’d suddenly grown two heads.

“I know that name,” he said faintly. Then, seeming to come back to himself, he shook his head and looked down at his hamburger. “American hamburgers.” He sighed happily. “I’m so sick of mad cow disease.” He picked it up with both hands and took a big bite, closing his eyes in pleasure.

Now what? How did I get from here to having him tell me everything about Ciaran and getting Ciaran to come to Widow’s Vale? Somehow I had to find a way. Every day, every hour counted. At this very minute Alyce was at Practical Magick, feeling a heavy mantle of doom lowering over her head.

“How did you found out about Ciaran?” Killian asked after a minute, taking another bite. Apparently discovering he had a half sister hadn’t dulled his appetite.

“I’ve read Maeve’s Book of Shadows,” I said. “She talks about Ciaran in it. Then in New York, I sort of—got into trouble. Ciaran helped me get out of it. And we figured it out how we knew each other… that he was my father. I–I have his eyes.”

“Yes, you do,” Killian said, studying my face.

“Anyway,” I went on. “He helped me, and he’s my biological father. I didn’t get a chance to really talk to him in New York or even to thank him.” I shrugged and glanced up to find Killian looking at me intently, and I felt a surprising strength coming from him.

“But you weren’t raised by Maeve,” Killian said quietly. “You couldn’t have been. How did you come to be here, in Widow’s Vale?”

“Maeve put me up for adoption,” I explained. “My family, the Rowlandses, adopted me. They’re the only parents I’ve ever known. I have a sister, but not a blood sister, of course. I mean, when I realized that I have an actual half brother… by blood.”

Mary K., please forgive me.

Killian blinked, as if this notion were just occurring to him. He focused on his food, working his way through his burger and shake with steady intent.

As the minutes went by, I felt more and more anxious. What if Killian hated me, the flesh-and-blood evidence of his father betraying his mother? At last he looked up, his plate completely clean. He smiled.

“Well! A little sister,” he said cheerfully. “Brilliant. I always hated being the baby.” He stood and leaned across the table to kiss me on the cheek. “Welcome to the family.” He made a rueful face. “Such as it is. Now. What do they have for pudding here?”

I watched as Killian devoured a slab of chocolate silk pie, and the new silence felt awkward. I studied Killian, trying to think, trying to prod my addled brain into motion. I needed more information from him. That was why eh was here. I needed to know everything he could tell me.

“Was Ciaran a… good father?” I asked.

“Not particularly,” Killian said, sitting sideways on his bench and putting his feet up. “He wasn’t around you a lot, you know. He and mum hate each other. He used to come around a couple of times a year, and he would test us kids and find us all wanting and blame my mother, and she’d cry, and then he’d take off.”

“That isn’t how I pictured it at all,” I said. “I thought, he’s your real father. He would teach you. He would show you magick. I thought you were so lucky to have him around.”

“Nope.” Killian seemed unconcerned, but I could tell it was a facade. “What about you? How’s your dad?”

“Great,” I said. “He’s really brilliant—does all sorts of research and design and experiments. But then he’ll leave his glasses in the fridge, and forget to put gas in his car, so it runs out, and you’ll ask him to get something and find him an hour later, reading in his office.”

Killian laughed. “But he’s nice?”

“Really nice. He loves me a lot.”

“There you go, then.” Killian rubbed his hands together and looked up, as if to say, Shall we go?

“It must be difficult for you,” I said quickly, trying to keep this conversation going. “I mean… I hope you’re not upset with me. For bringing you here. For springing all this stuff on you so quickly.”

Killian looked surprised for a moment, and then he seemed to regard me differently. He gave me a rueful smile. “Well, love, it’s not as though my family life has been The Cosby Show. Finding out I have a sister…” He seemed to take me in, and at that moment I felt a sense of connection to him, like this wasn’t just an awkward conversation between strangers. I sensed in him that—kinship, I guess—that sprang from this less-than-ideal connection by blood. “… well, there are worse ways to spend a Monday afternoon.”

I smiled in response, and immediately started to feel guilty about using Killian to get through to Ciaran. It saddened me to think that he was a real person, my real half brother, with feelings, and I was really only getting to know him as part of a spy maneuver. The fate of Starlocket was a pretty good motivation, but I was beginning to feel that I liked Killian and that I might enjoy getting to know him even if Ciaran wasn’t involved.

“So do you and Ciaran ever… see each other?”

Killian made a face as though he tasted something sour and took a last sip of chocolate milk shake. “No.” He shifted, and I realized that all at once that he was incredibly uncomfortable with this conversation and wanted to flee. “I’m beat sis,” he said as I kicked myself mentally for not changing the subject earlier. “It was lovely speaking with you. I’ll see you around.”

“But—” I watched helplessly as Killian left some money on the table and walked briskly out the door. “Killian! Wait!” I threw some money down on top of Killian’s, grabbed my stuff, and ran out the door behind him. How would he get home? We were too far from anything to walk. Widow’s Vale wasn’t exactly a place were you can hail a taxi.

But I didn’t see Killian in the parking lot, and a quick scan of the highway found no pedestrians, no cars headed in either direction. In fact, I realized, I hadn’t heard a car go by in the last five minutes or so. I looked back at the parking lot, moving closer to study the woods on the perimeter of the lot. There were no footprints anywhere; the ground looked untouched by human feet. Frustrated, I leaned against Das Boot and took my last look around. Where had he gone? Had he actually used magick to get away from me?

Finally, after a few more minutes trying to make sense of it, I climbed into Das Boot, checking my watch. Five o’clock. Barely twenty-four hours after accepting Eoife’s mission, and I was already feeling pretty certain that I just ruined the council’s plan.

Eoife was staying at Hunters and Sky’s, and Hunter answered the phone when I called. The sound of his voice made my heart flutter inside my chest, but I ruthlessly pushed down the pain.

“Hunter? I need to talk to Eoife.”

“What’s wrong?” Hunter’s voice was warm with concern. Oh, Goddess, I thought, I can’t talk to you about how I’ve already ruined everything.

“Um—Killian’s here. But he kind of… got away.”

“Got away?” Some of the warmth leached out of his voice, and I sucked in my breath to prepare for his disappointment.

“Well—”

“Listen, Eoife just walked in.” Hunter cut me off. “I’ll put her on.”

Before I could react, Hunter was gone from the line and I heard Eoife’s voice. “Morgan? Is there a problem?”

“Well,” I began, “Killian came, and we were talking, but he took off before I could talk to him about calling Ciaran. And then he sort of… disappeared, and now I don’t know where he is or when I’ll see him again.”

“Morgan, calm down. It’s not a disaster.” Eoife’s sensible voice, if not exactly warm, still calmed my nerves a bit. “Listen, I was just heading out to attend a Starlocket circle. Would you like to come meet me there?”

Starlocket? Oh, no. How could I face Alyce and all of the innocent members of Starlocket when I might have just thrown away their one chance for survival?

“I don’t know Eoife. I mean… maybe this mission isn’t for me. Maybe you should find someone who’s better equipped—”

“Morgan,” Eoife interrupted me, “I think you’re overreacting. Come with me to the circle—it will calm you down. And we can talk a bit about how to approach Killian from now on.”

I sighed. It would calm me to attend a circle, especially since I’d skipped Kithic’s this week. And Alyce was always a warm and comforting presence—I could only hope that no harm would come to her anytime soon. “All right,” I said finally. “Where is it?”

Starlocket was meeting at a cozy, cedar-shingled house on the outskirts of town. When I rang the doorbell, the door was answered by a tall, formidable woman who looked to be in her late thirties. She had long, dark brown hair that reached all the way down to her butt, and she wore a brilliant robe of purple silk. “Hello,” she greeted me.

“Hi,” I said. “I’m Morgan Rowlands. I’m a friend of Alyce and Eoife’s.”

“It’s nice to meet you, Morgan.” The woman regarded me calmly. “Welcome to my home. I’m Suzanna Mearis.” Suzanna stepped back from the doorway and gestured into a small living room. “The circle will be held in here. Eoife hasn’t arrived yet.”

I thanked Suzanna and headed past her into the warm, golden-hued room. Nature-themed oil paintings adorned the wall in shades of green, gold, orange, and red. A rust-colored velvet couch sat before a brick fireplace, and candles burned in every available surface. Several members of the coven were sitting on the couch, chatting, and I noticed Alyce standing by a window, looking out into the night. I walked over to her. “Alyce?” I said softly. She turned and hugged me tightly without a word.

“Morgan,” she whispered finally. “I’m so happy you’ve come.”

“It’s good to be here.” Seeing Alyce made me realize how much I’d missed my friend and confidante, and I had to fight back tears.

Alyce’s eyes met mine, and I could see her concern shining there. Her voice dropped. “I know that you had a difficult time in New York.”

A difficult time, I thought. Difficult was right. One blessing of this new assignment was that it kept my mind off just how much my life had changed in the last week. I nodded, not feeling up to talking about it just now, even to Alyce.

“Morgan?” I felt a hand on my shoulder and turned to find Eoife in a green linen robe. “We should talk.”

I nodded and followed Eoife to a private corner of the room, after saying good-bye to Alyce, and promising we’d get together as soon as possible.

“Listen,” Eoife began, “Killian isn’t going to open up to you right away. What we’ve asked you to do us to get close to him, and that’s going to take more than just one meeting. Given what we know about Killian’s upbringing, I can imagine that he doesn’t trust people too easily. If you were able to make contact and tell him who you are, you should consider this first meeting successful.”