I’ll explain later,mouthed Rowan. She turned to Hayleigh. “Can you remember your room number?”
“Sixteen.”
The answer arrived with no hesitation—a very specific memory. Once again, it was a good sign that not too much was gone.
Clearly, it had been interpreted by the powers that be that they should erase Rowan from Hayleigh’s mind, but would that take things associated with Rowan as well? Or would those clumped memories simply be patchy and incomplete? Like worn-out stretches of film strip?
“What day do you think it is?” asked Rowan.
“December twenty-third.”
“Correct. And do you know why you’re…here?”
“I’m in town on business. And this place is the best this town has to offer…” Then she smiled secretly. “For the time being.”
Well, it was still Hayleigh in there all right—simply a Hayleigh who didn’t remember Rowan.
Door sixteen came into sight. “Well, it seems like you remember just about everything. Maybe, um, drink some water? Take a nap?”
Hayleigh slid an old-fashioned, solid-looking key into the lock. “Water, yes, good idea. No nap, though.”
“Oh? Busy day?”
Hayleigh grabbed the edge of her door and nodded with a wink. “I’ve got a date to get ready for.”
Zaide paced at the base of the staircase with her hands behind her head, elbows stretched wide, as Rowan fled down the stairs. She snagged her friend and said in a low voice, “Outside for a debrief.”
Rowan began with the “good,” because even though the information she’d gleaned had been hard to hear, the spell had worked. They’d gotten the information they needed.
“Oh, thosemotherfuckers.” Zaide pulled out a vape pen from her pocket and took a hit, releasing a puff of THC into the air. She offered it to Rowan, who turned it down with a wave.
“Listen, though, there’s more…”
“More? They going to beat us all with sticks on our way out of town to just really rub it in?” Her face took on a morbidly amused look. “Sorry, I was imagining that, but with giant candy canes. Not really funny, though.” She finished with another dab and a sigh of smoke that crystallized in the cold air.
“A little funny,” admitted Rowan, laughing bitterly at the image of Hayleigh chasing her down the street while wielding a candy cane the size of her body.
Then she sobered. Zaide studied her and in a low voice asked, “You wiped her memory?”
A surge of nausea rolled through Rowan. The way Zaide was looking at her now was exactly what she had always feared. Like her oldest friend was wondering if there was anything Rowan had ever madeherforget about.
The exact reason no one could ever trust a mind witch.
“Yes,” said Rowan, softly. “But all I wanted to wipe was what just happened. Not…my entire existence.” She tangled her fingers in her hair, tugging hard, coming away with a few strands. It was a habit she needed to break, but it was hard to stop when she was stressed. “She seems to remember everything else. Who she is, why she’s here, her job, Gavin…but no Rowan.”
“Well,” muttered Zaide, “she arrived at the proverbial ‘found out’ stage of fucking around.”
“What am I going to do?”
“I don’t know…” said Zaide, glancing away. “This is way above my experience level. If you want answers, you’re gonna need to spill to a more experienced witch.”
“Notmy mom.”
“Yeah, no, definitely not Liliana. But I dunno, your uncle?”
“Uncle Drew doesn’t know much about what goes on outside his own pungent wheelhouse.”
“Mmm…” Zaide snapped her fingers. “Birdie?”
