This knowledge that had so thrilled her sent a shiver of horror up my back. Beside me, Nova had gone statue-still with stress. I’d now lost all feeling in my fingers, and had to gently pry her hand away from my upper arm. Veronica was too caught up in her own story now to notice what we were doing. It was clear, now that she had a captive audience, that she was enjoying herself. This story was centuries in the making, and she was the one who got to tell it.
She went on, “The more I considered it, the more I thought the pageant was the key to everything. It would bring theentire town together. If I could separate you from all those who might be able to protect you, I would have a better chance of success. And so, I put the pageant at the center of my efforts. I also wanted to meet you, and so I suggested to Luca that we do some sightseeing in town. It was strange seeing you for the first time and realizing how… insignificant you were. How unimpressive. Just a little mouse of a thing, aren’t you? Just utterly forgettable.”
She laughed, and there was no malice in her voice. It was more… incredulity than anything else.
“And then you told us about the script, how it was so terrible, and that you were looking to improve it somehow. That provided the opening I’d been looking for. The next step was planting the book. It was almost ludicrously easy, with Luca working here every day. I simply told him that his uncle had found the book left behind on the stage and to put it in the prop box. He did so gladly, unaware of the magic the book contained.” She sighed. “I had to put a spell on it so that it would make its presence known to someone. Imagine my delight when that someone turned out to be you.”
Guilt, sharp and hot, bubbled in my stomach. I was so stupid, so gullible. I’d played right into her hands, and delivered the one thing she needed to carry out her plan. I wanted to scream. Sure, Zale had been immediately on board, but he had been desperate to make his mark on the pageant. He would have done anything, even ignore the most basic of magical safety guidelines, in order to make that happen. And I was too ignorant to warn against it.
“Don’t be too hard on yourself,” Veronica said, as though she could hear what I was thinking. “You really didn’t have a hope once you opened the book. It would have ensnared you all at once.”
We’d all been ensnared, I thought. After the cheesy, hackneyed lines of the old script, the book had breathed freshlife into the pageant. We’d all agreed to use it. Perhaps if Nova hadn’t been grounded, she would have had the good sense to stop us, but somehow I doubted it. We were damned from the moment we opened it.
“I’d enchanted the words so that when they were spoken on the solstice, they would turn every witch within its hearing into a waking dreamer. All except for one.” She smiled at me again, a smile that seemed almost… loving. Like she somehow thought she was doing all of this for me instead of for herself. It was the most disturbing thing I’d seen from her up until that very moment. She went on, “But once everyone who could protect you was neutralized, how to lure you here? I toyed with the idea of asking Luca to do it, but in the end, I decided against it. That boy is not as obtuse as his father, a trying complication I hadn’t considered when I married the man. Men usually can’t seem to help but love me, but Luca… well, he never really warmed to me.”
Despite my terror, a bubble of hope rose in my chest. “Luca’s… not your son?”
“Surely you knew that,” Veronica snorted. “I was under the impression he couldn’t wait to out me as the evil stepmother.”
Relief flooded through me. Luca wasn’t a Kildare. Luca hadn’t known anything about this. He hadn’t been a knowing participant in this plot to lure me here. I was so relieved that I almost missed what Veronica said next.
“…like I said, too perceptive to be useful. He would question me. I couldn’t risk it. But then I thought, hmmm, maybe I could use him in a different way.”
My breath froze in my lungs and the relief drained away, to be replaced with an icy fear. “What do you mean, use him?” I asked. “You better not have… if you hurt him…”
Veronica laughed, a high, tinkling sort of giggle that made me shudder. “For goodness sake, stop being so melodramatic. You’dalmost think I was some kind of villain; but I’m not a monster, Wren, whatever impression you might have of me right now. I’m explaining all of this to you so that you can start to understand your place in all of this—how we got here. No, Luca is just fine. Working on his car out in the garage when I left. It’s a very powerful spell, the glamour I used to create the illusion of him. If you’d touched him, he even would have felt real to you. But in order for it to work, I needed his essence. A hair or two taken from his hairbrush was enough.”
“What about Bea?” Nova asked. I jumped, having almost forgotten she was right beside me. “How did she get wrapped up in all of this? How did you get her essence? Felony kidnapping?”
Again, Veronica laughed. “My goodness, you are determined to think the worst of me, aren’t you? As the day of the festival grew nearer, I saw that Wren was much more involved in the production of the pageant than I had originally thought. She had all but taken it over. I thought it unlikely that Luca would be able to pull her away with a simple invitation to walk the beach with him, even if she did have the crush on him that I suspected she had.” She raised her eyebrows at me, as though asking the silent question.
I kept my mouth shut, but the blood flaming in my cheeks answered for me.
She looked gratified. She turned back to Nova, and continued to answer her question. “Well, as I said, I couldn’t count on her going with him. She’d put a great deal of effort into the pageant. She’d likely want to stay and see the fruits of her labors. And so I had to think of another way, something more compelling. And then she showed up at the theater with Beatriz. I had to assess the relationship quickly, but I’d always been gifted when it came to understanding the ties that bind people. I could see that the girl was very timid, and painfully shy. I could also see that Wren felt protective of her. Something had formed there—a kinship ofsorts. I knew I could use that to my advantage. I offered to let the girl try on some wigs and hats, and in the process, I procured the necessary hairs. Of course, I had to make sure to find a way to keep Beatriz from the festival, or Wren might have seen her in the crowd and ruined everything. A simple charm cast while picking up some lunch at the restaurant that day did the trick.”
Anger flared in me as I remembered that moment in the cafe, and Veronica, sensing it, turned her attention back to me. “I already told you, Wren. Beatriz is perfectly safe. I wouldn’t harm a hair on that girl’s head… though I might steal one or two.” She smirked wryly. “Beatriz simply will have found herself unable to keep her eyes open as the afternoon went on; and by evening, she will have been so tired, she would have no choice but to go to bed. She had expressed a dislike for the noise and crowds of the festival, which led me to believe that no one would be too suspicious if she didn’t want to go. She is no doubt sleeping soundly, and will wake feeling refreshed and perfectly herself.”
Nova looked like she wanted to say something, but she just chewed viciously at the inside of her cheek. I could tell she still wouldn’t trust Veronica as far as she could throw her, no matter how Veronica tried to make herself sound like the rational adult in the room. Veronica was in league with the Darkness. That was all either of us really needed to know.
“And so, with the real Luca happily building his car, and the real Beatriz enjoying sweet dreams, there was nothing left to stand in my way. It all unfolded smoothly. The pageant began. The spell took effect. My one moment of fear came when I thought you might turn to an outsider for help—so recently returned as you were, I wasn’t sure if you knew better than to betray the magical population to the outside world; and even if you did, I thought there was a chance you might be desperate enough to do it anyway. But again, my luck held. You were braver and smarter than I had given you credit for. You chasedafter Beatriz alone, isolating yourself from the others. Then I sent the Luca glamour to meet you, and lead you in the right direction. The only complication I hadn’t foreseen was you.” Veronica turned to look appraisingly at Nova, as though she still hadn’t decided just how big of a complication she was.
“So sorry to spoil your plans,” Nova said, a sneer in her voice.
Veronica smiled pleasantly. “You haven’t spoiled anything as of yet,” she said.
“I’ve only just arrived,” Nova said. “Give me time.”
Veronica’s smile widened. “Oh, I will. And I’ll give you a choice. What you do with that choice will be your own business. You will decide your fate, Second Daughter, not me.”
“What the hell does that mean?” Nova shouted, and though her tone was angry, I knew that it was actually fear that was driving her words.
“What I mean is that I’ve told you all there is to know. There is no more reason to delay. We’ve reached the moment when we all must decide what part we will play,” Veronica said. “Wren is here. She is the pentamaleficus of the first blood, the long-awaited key to opening this lock. So now she has a decision to make.”
“You’re saying I actually have a choice?” I asked, incredulous.
“Of course you do,” Veronica said, and then turned her attention to the dais in the middle of the room, her eyes sparkling with a covetous light. “But surely this place has been calling to you, as deeply and consistently as it has been calling to me. You are the only one who can accept its invitation. You must have been longing to find it from the moment you knew of its existence.”
It seemed pointless to contradict her. The truth was that I had never given the source a second thought. I’d had a little too much else on my mind since arriving in Sedgwick Cove. EvenNova, who had known about the deep magic all her life, looked skeptical and a bit wary.
