The birds were singing.
I stirred, aware that something soft was beneath my head, but the rest of me was lying on something cool and hard. I wasn’t outside anymore. I couldn’t feel any moss beneath me or any wind on my skin. My backpack was gone. There was a sweet smell, like caramel, berries, and new grass. Another smell too, familiar but distant…tea. It was Earl Gray tea.
A piano was playing. It intertwined with the bird song, creating a symphony unlike anything I’d ever heard. It didn’t arouse my memories, it aroused feelings: the feeling of curling up close to my dad near the fire. Of hugging Marcus. Of my mom reading a bedtime story.
Of Zane. Looking at me. Kissing me. Holding me.
Zane. Where the fuck was Zane?
The piano stopped. There was a soft clinking sound and a little sigh. I wasn’t alone.
I opened my eyes. It took a few blinks for my vision to fully come into focus, but as it did, I realized I was lying on a pale tile floor. A knit sweater had been folded beneath my head like a pillow. Vines dangled above me, and I was surrounded by potted plants and raised garden beds. There were trees, flowers, bushes — everything fragrant and vibrant with life. I was in a large greenhouse, with a domed glass ceiling high above where birds fluttered through the air. I shook my head dizzily, trying to raise it from the ground.
“Be careful. He was rough with you.”
I stiffened. Her voice was so familiar, even after so many years.
“Everly Hadleigh?” She looked almost the same as she had in high school. Her blonde hair was longer now, trailing down her back to her waist. She wore a long black dress, the bodice covered in lace, and her feet were bare.
“Everly Laverne, please,” she said softly. She had a porcelain teacup in front of her, set upon the metal table she was sitting beside. She sipped from the cup slowly, her hand slightly shaking. “My father never wanted me to have his name anyway.”
I sat up slowly, and winced as my head throbbed. When the darkness of those wings had enveloped me, I’d truly thought I was going to die. Especially after seeing the way that thing had thrown around Zane…
“Where’s my demon?” I said sharply. I thought of the creature’s foot crashing down on his face, the force with which he’d been thrown — a sick, cold feeling of dread coiled in my stomach. “Where the hell is he?”
“With Callum. He’s alive,” she added quickly. “Callum won’t allow him near me, so…”
“What the fuck is a Callum?” I lurched to my feet, wincing at the ache. I must have been curled up on the floor for a while: every muscle was stiff. Everly looked significantly more nervous now that I was standing up.
“He’s the…he’s…” She frowned slightly, as if she was grasping for the right words. “He’s my demon. He’s the guardian of this place. Of…me. I didn’t mean for him to be so rough with you. With either of you.” Her hands clenched in her lap. “But your demon…Zane…he’s fine. I mean…” She shrugged. “They heal quickly.”
“Don’t you fucking talk about him like it’s not a big deal that your demon bashed his fucking face in,” I hissed. That moment consumed my every thought, fueling my rage. Wherever the hell her demon was, I wanted to fucking kill him for touching Zane like that.
Everly’s face was somber, her mouth pressed into a thin, hard line. “Did you come here to kill me, Juniper Kynes?”
The birdsong stopped. The greenhouse was deathly silent and suddenly cold. She knew who I was — but of course she did. It was a dangerous time to tell the truth, but I’d found the truth was dangerous more often than not.
“You remember me,” I said. “You looked terrified when you saw me in Abelaum. You looked like you’d seen a ghost.”
“Memories are far more frightening than ghosts.” Her finger traced slowly along the plate beneath her teacup, following the delicate curves of the porcelain. She’d averted her eyes, and was chewing her lower lip.
“Memories,” I repeated bitterly. “Oh yeah, I know all about how frightening they can be. You want to talk about scary memories? We share one: you, me…and your mother. Is she here? Is Heidi Laverne here?” I raised my voice, and it echoed around the eerily quiet greenhouse.
Everly seemed to shrink under my raised voice. “My mother is dead,” she said softly. “Her mistakes…” She paused and cleared her throat. “I can’t apologize for her. An apology probably isn’t even what you want to hear. She regretted everything. She tried to make things right.”
“She tried to make things right?” I laughed. I needed a weapon. I needed my gun back, my knife, something, anything. But even armed, even if I managed to kill her, there was no way in hell I’d escape her demon. “What have you done to make things right, Everly? You were there too, hiding in the shadows like a fucking coward!”
I lunged toward her, too furious to think straight. But something smooth and cool whipped out and snapped around my wrist, jerking me back. I looked down and found a green vine coiled around my arm.
“What the fuck is this?” I tugged at it, and suddenly my other wrist was caught too. I was yanked back, prevented from getting any closer to her by the shockingly strong vines.
“Please don’t be violent,” she said.
The sickening realization that I was trapped here made my stomach lurch. Trapped, separated from Zane — and although she claimed he was safe and unharmed, I didn’t believe that. Not for a second. He could be injured, he could be…
He could be dead. I swallowed hard, the thought hitting me so brutally that for a moment I couldn’t breathe. Zane could already be dead. She might have taken the only thing I had left, the tiny spark of joy I’d found in this darkness.
His warmth, his protection, his ridiculous sarcastic jokes, his massive fucking ego — if she’d taken that, if she or her demon had harmed him —
I clenched my fists to stop their shaking, forcing myself to keep breathing slowly. I had to keep it together.
But the rage was bubbling up. Not just rage at Heidi, at Everly, at the Hadleighs or at the Libiri. It was rage that I lived with those memories every day. Rage that so many parts of me were irrevocably broken. No matter what I did, I couldn’t escape what had happened. No amount of vengeance would bring my brother back. No amount of blood I spilled could drown out the memories.
“Don’t be violent? Don’t be violent? You listened to me scream for help and did nothing!” I yelled. Everly flinched, and she looked like she was going to be sick. “Was it fun for you, Everly? Did it make you happy to see some innocent girl suffer for your God? Did you —”
“I don’t serve that God!”
Glass shattered somewhere above, and Everly flinched at the sound. Her breathing had grown rapid and she quickly looked away from me, gripping the edge of the table. It was like she was fighting with herself, struggling to hold something back.
“I spent years with your family, Everly. Victoria was my best friend,” I spat out the words, sickening as they were. “I trusted your father. I trusted your mother. I trusted you. You never warned me, you never told me to stay away. You never even tried, and your mother didn’t either. You both are fucking sick. You both deserve to die for what you let them do to me!”
“I can’t make it right,” she said. “I was supposed to be inspired, that’s what they told me. I was supposed to witness something beautiful and be left in awe of God’s power. All I saw was torture. There wasn’t a day I could look at my mother after that and not see it.” Her eyes shone with tears for a moment, only for her to rapidly blink them away. “But she’s dead. And I am not my mother.”
I wanted to break something, hit something. I wanted to scream. It felt mocking, that she had witnessed the worst thing that had ever happened to me but felt like she could remove herself from it, like she could be distant from it. She had the memories too, but she didn’t have to be trapped by them. She didn’t have to see the scars every day.
I curled my lip in disgust. “But you are your father’s daughter.”
“He didn’t raise me like them,” she said. “He raised me, but not like them.” She stood, and a rumble like thunder moved through the floor. “He was clear, always, that I was not the daughter he wanted; I was only the one he needed. I wish I could change it. I wish I hadn’t been afraid. I wish I hadn’t spent so many years afraid.”
The porcelain cup shattered, splattering tea everywhere. It dripped down the table, pooling on the floor, and Everly sighed heavily. She let go of the table, staring at the shattered glass with bitter resignation.
I’d had no idea what to expect coming here. But this woman in front of me wasn’t the cold-hearted, Evil-God-worshipping witch I’d imagined. She wasn’t even the heartless Hadleigh I’d imagined. She was something else.
A storm. A storm like me. A bomb on the verge of exploding.
“What are you going to do, Everly?” I said softly. “Turn your demon on me? Or kill me yourself?”
“I don’t want you dead, Juniper. I need you alive. I need you to finish what you set out to do.”
I tested the strength of the vines again, but they still didn’t budge. “And what is it you think I set out to do?”
“Kill the Hadleighs. Destroy the Libiri. Make sure they can’t complete another sacrifice.” She stepped closer to me, and goosebumps prickled up my arms. There was something about her, something I only noticed once she was close. The air itself was charged around her, as if electricity was coursing from her. “That’s why you’re still in Abelaum, isn’t it? I can only guess that your brother’s death brought you back…but revenge made you stay. That’s why you’re out here, isn’t it? You came out here to kill me.”
“Well, I sure as hell didn’t come out here for a goddamn tea party,” I said. “Are you trying to bargain with me?”
She shook her head. “I’m trying to make it clear I’m not your enemy.”
I frowned. “You mean you’ve turned against the Libiri? Against your family?”
“They’re not my family,” she said. “They were never my family. The blood of the coven is thicker than the water of the womb, and I am the last of my coven. Our goals are intertwined, Juniper; yours and mine.”
“What’s your goal then?”
“To end all this,” she said. “To kill the God.”
For a moment, I thought I must have heard her wrong. “How is that possible?” I said. “It’s a God. It’s…I don’t even know if It’s a physical thing…and you think you’re going to kill It?”
“I’m going to,” she said firmly. “I have to. I’m the only one left who can. But if the Libiri complete their sacrifices, and the God is set free, then there will be nothing I can do. Earth, as we know it, will end. Humanity will end.”
She waved her hand and the vines holding me captive let go, retreating back to their planters. I rubbed my wrists, resisting the urge to lunge at her again.
“My mother realized her mistakes too late,” she said. “She trusted Kent’s preaching more than her own knowledge for too long. She hurt people. She hurt you. I don’t blame you for hating her, or for hating me. She went back for you that night because she wanted to try to take it all back.” She turned away, leaving herself vulnerable, her back turned to me. Was it an extension of trust, or was it a trap? Was she trying to lure me into attacking her, so she could retaliate and hurt me?
But if she’d wanted to hurt me, she’d easily have already done so.
“My mother couldn’t bear the mistakes she made. She couldn’t face them.” Everly’s shoulders swelled and then sank with a heavy sigh. “I can’t erase her mistakes. But I can refuse to make the same ones she did.”
She seemed sincere. When she glanced back at me, the pain on her face was undeniable.
“I’m not trying to save the world, Everly,” I said. “I’m not a hero. I’m…angry. I’m only angry. What I’m trying to do isn’t deep, or selfless, or courageous. It’s bitter. It’s selfish. It won’t fix anything or bring anyone back.” I shook my head. “Look, what you’re trying to do is noble. And probably impossible. I can’t help you.”
“Yes, you can,” she said. “Because all you need to do is what you’ve wanted to do all along: kill them. Kill them all, before they can destroy anyone else’s life. They’re moving to take the next sacrifice, Juniper. You know they are. You’ve seen it.”
“Raelynn Lawson,” I muttered. “She’s not my problem.”
“But stopping the Hadleighs before they kill her is in your interest,” she said, a note of desperation in her voice. “If they make another sacrifice, the God’s power grows. It’ll be even harder for you to kill Kent, harder to kill any of them.”
She was right. But I’d set out to do this for myself; I couldn’t pretend it was for any other purpose. This wasn’t a mission to save humanity, this was no hero’s journey. This was for me. It was the only way forward, the only path I saw for myself. I couldn’t just move on from the pain. I couldn’t start over, I couldn’t live, because the shadow of the Libiri was always over me.
The only thing I cared about in this fucked up world was me. I’d survived because of how hard I’d fought.
Except…that wasn’t entirely true anymore, was it? Down in the mine, trying to get Marcus out, I should have died. Up on the mountain, fighting the Eld, I should have been torn apart.
I wasn’t fighting alone anymore. And as much as it frightened me…I no longer cared only for myself.
I cared about Zane too.
He was the first thing I’d thought of as I woke up. He was the first thing I’d feared losing. Even now, my nails were digging into my palms with the force of the anxiety that he wasn’t with me. I still didn’t know if he was okay.
Even if it was only in the most minuscule way, my actions weren’t just about me anymore.
“I’m not trying to recruit you to a cause, Juniper,” Everly said. “I’m not asking you to forgive me, or forgive my mother. But you can’t kill me.” Her voice hardened, taking on an edge that caught me off guard. “If you try, Callum will destroy you. He’ll destroy your demon too. Don’t make me your enemy.”
I narrowed my eyes, regarding her carefully. I doubted I could trust her, but what would she gain by lying to me now? How did it benefit her to formulate this whole story instead of just killing me?
She’d had her chance, and her demon could have easily done it too. The only thing I could assume was that she was telling the truth.
“So I kill the Hadleighs,” I said. “Just like I planned. I destroy the Libiri, and you destroy the God. Is that the deal?”
She nodded. “Kill them. Make them all suffer. And we’ll see this end.” She picked up a bit of shattered porcelain from the ground, slicing her finger as she did. She watched the blood drip down and laughed softly. “Callum will smell me bleeding. He’ll worry. Let’s walk together.”
The witch’s house was massive. Walking through its long halls, I felt as if I’d stepped back in time. Some of the walls were richly papered with a dark filigree pattern, others were paneled with wood. But there were some walls that looked even older, made of carved stone. It was the kind of place that should have felt dilapidated, but there was no dust, no cobwebs. The floors shone, and the rugs and tapestries were rich in their colors, as if they were new.
“If you want to kill Kent, you’ll get your best opportunity on October 31st,” she said. She kept sucking the cut on her finger, and pressing it against her dress to stave off the bleeding.
“Halloween. How fitting.”
“Victoria still throws a Halloween party every year,” she said. “I remember you came to a couple.”
No one who’d been to a Hadleigh party could ever forget it. I’d attended the first one when I was thirteen. The Hadleighs’ massive house would fill with people, drinks would flow, drugs would be passed around. In crowds like that, it was easy to make someone disappear.
“They always claim their parents go out of town,” Everly said. “But they don’t. Kent will be there to keep an eye on things, especially if they’re going to try to take Raelynn. And I think they will. She has no family in the state. She has a close friend, who isn’t involved with the Libiri, but that doesn’t offer her much protection.” She chewed her thumbnail, obvious worry on her face. I sighed.
“I’ll try to keep her away from them,” I said. “If I see her. But I’m not going out of my way to do it.”
Everly smiled in relief, nodding her head. “Thank you. Trust me, the party will be a good opportunity for you. If you can find Kent, he’ll likely be alone. It’ll be noisy, everyone will be drunk.”
“No one will notice a few gunshots,” I said.
“Exactly. And another thing.” She paused in the middle of the hall, her eyes narrowed in thought. “If there’s one thing Kent is paranoid about, it’s demons. Keeping Leon made him nervous — he always suspected the demon would try to kill him at the slightest opportunity. He was right, of course. But Leon ended up going after Jeremiah, since he couldn’t get at Kent.”
“So Kent is protected somehow,” I said. “Will Zane be able to get near him?”
“Kent carries an amulet that prevents most paranormal entities from harming him,” she said. “But if you can get the amulet off him, your demon won’t have a problem. Kent has other artifacts too, old ones his grandfather brought out of the mine nearly a century ago, and things my mother gave him too. I don’t know what most of them do, and I don’t think Kent does either. The family has a lot of magic at their disposal, if they figure out how to use it.”
“Got it. So we go to the party, prevent human sacrifice, kill Kent. Sounds like a good night.”
“Once my father is dead, the Libiri will be left scrambling. They’ll be vulnerable.” She paused, and I wondered if it felt strange for her to talk about killing her own father. She didn’t speak about the man with any affection, but still. She blinked rapidly, and turned away from me to look back down the hall. “Don’t be afraid. Callum is coming.”
