“Oh, right,” Talon mutters, like the memory’s just coming back. “Only the grave-digging part came from there.”
Cassian nods. “Exactly.”
I narrow my eyes at him.
“So what, you’re some kind of supernatural expert now?”
“No,” he says, calm and flat. “I’m just the one who’s been obsessed with this the longest.”
That shuts me up for a moment. Cassian doesn’t say things like that, especially not without meaning them. His voice is too steady for how dark that admission is. And he’s not looking at me when he says it. Just staring at the journal like he’s seeing through it. Or beyond it.
“Obsessed,” I repeat quietly.
Cassian finally meets my eyes.
“Wouldn’t you be, if your sister was murdered in front of you and you saw her literal fucking soul leave her body?”
The silence is immediate. Heavy. Like the oxygen’s been sucked out of the room.
Nathaniel’s jaw clenches, and even Talon stops smirking. I don’t say anything. Because whatisthere to say?
“Thought so. Flip two more pages,” Cassian adds. “That’s where it gets to the point.”
I flip.
This page is different; cleaner, but somehow worse. The handwriting is tighter, more meticulous. Like whoever wrote it had finally stopped running and decided to document their own slow descent.
The Wraith is made of absence. To kill it, you must make it remember.
I glance up. “What the hell is that supposed to mean?”
“Her human life,” Nathaniel says. “Apparently, the wraith is just a shell of who she used to be, driven only by her worst instincts. The writer calls the process aBinding of Memory. The idea is to summon her human self first, which should make her vulnerable.”
Well, I see now why Cassian is so unconvinced.
From what I saw, the Candy Maker knew exactly what she was. There wasn’t a trace of guilt or grief in her. She enjoyed being a monster. AndBinding of Memory? Sounds like something a wannabe necromancer came up with after licking too many suspicious rocks.
“Okay,” I say, “let me get this straight. We’re going to trust some untested, borderline-insane ritual written by what’s probably a lunatic, and what? Wave it at the wraith like it’s holy scripture and hope she takes a walk down memory lane?”
“No, there’s more about how to do it on another page,” Nathaniel says, deadpan. “And before you dismiss it, it’s better than doing nothing.”
“Is it, though?” I shoot back. “Because honestly, betting on my powers kicking in long enough to track and flicker to her might be more reliable.”
“If your powers were stable enough for that, we’d jump on it,” Nathaniel says. “But they’re not, are they? Otherwise you wouldn’t have to sleep until…” —he checks his watch— “two p.m.”
Two p.m.? I glance at Talon.
“My shift ended at seven,” he offers. “You passed out around two a.m. the first time.”
I do the math in my head. The nightly sex break couldn’t have lasted more than thirty minutes. It was fast. Intense. So I slept… what, just under twelve hours?
What the hell?
“Anyway, according to this, we’ll need three things for the binding,” Cassian cuts in.
Nathaniel steps over, scans the page, and reads aloud: “‘A piece of the wraith’s body… a relic from its life… and an offering of soul-bound power.’”
I stare at him. “I’m sorry, a what now?”
