“Check the floorboards again,” I said, and Olive—the tallest of the three, her strawberry-blonde hair yanked back in a too-tight bun—hunched her shoulders and poked a broom handle at the plank seams. They all reeked of nerves. I watched, lipspressed thin, as Maggie, she of the constantly peeling cuticles and wandering eye, scoured the stone hearth with a pocket mirror, looking for charms or sigils Laurel might have left behind.
None of them would dare look at me.
It still astonished me that Laurel Waters had managed to die without leaving so much as a strand of hair for me to use. Even now, her body lay embalmed on ice, waiting for whatever sanctimonious send-off the Hollow would cobble together. And not one of these idiots had thought to collect a single personal effect.
Olive hovered in the doorway to Aspen’s room, hands fluttering like anxious doves. “There’s nothing here, Wyrdmother. Every drawer’s empty, and the grimoire’s gone. We checked the loft too. Just old linens.”
I advanced, letting the heavy silence work on her. The room had been stripped to the bone. The girl’s duffel, the single quilt, even the photograph by the window had been taken. I surveyed the emptiness, then eyed the place where, as rumor had it, Laurel used to stash her potions: an alcove behind the bed, veiled with a strand of dried marjoram. The marjoram was gone, its scent obliterated by panic.
“Is it so hard to believe she saw us coming?” I muttered, more to myself than to them. “The last of her line, and she didn’t even try to hide.”
Maggie sidled up, a pair of latex gloves snapped over her hands. “Should we try a calling spell, Wyrdmother? If the grimoire’s in range, maybe we can—”
“No,” I cut her off. “She’d have shielded it by now. If that girl has half the brains her mother had, it’ll take more than a calling spell to flush her out.” I grabbed the edge of the mattress and flipped it, sending a drift of stale feathers into the air. A spider scrambled for cover; I flicked it away.
Behind me, Teela had started sorting through the kitchen trash, desperate for approval. She found nothing but coffee grounds and broken crockery. I snorted and moved to the living room, where the fire had been left to die a quiet, ashy death. I squatted beside the hearth, fingers searching for scorch marks, hidden sigils, any hint of what Laurel had been working on in her final hours.
There was nothing but a faint blue residue on the bricks. A charm for protection, maybe. It hadn’t worked.
Olive waited for me to stand before reporting, “The men you sent after Aspen—”
“Failed.” I finished for her, rising. “Of course they did. She’s her mother’s daughter, even if the magic never fully came in.” I dusted my hands, then turned a withering stare on the trio. “Which one of you watched the back road?”
Silence. Then, finally, Teela: “I did, Wyrdmother.”
“Then it’s your failure. Let it eat at you.” I let the words land, savoring the way she flinched. “Aspen Waters slipped into the woods and is halfway to freedom, grimoire in tow. Do you know how many generations of Waters witches that book spans? The spells within are older than the Hollow itself. I just hope I don’t have to explain to the High Coven that I lost it to a chubby little half-witch.”
I spat the last word, and the room seemed to contract around me. And even the Coven did not know the one spell that I was certain that book held. The spell that would set me at the head of the High Coven and the Council itself. It would set me at the head of the entire supernatural world.
Maggie tried to rally. “We have her mother’s blood. If you’d allow it, I can work an echoing spell—maybe use the blood to locate—”
I whirled on her. “There is no blood. You left the body on ice, didn’t you? Once it’s been preserved, it’s useless. You’d knowthat if you’d spent less time whoring around with the Garrets and more time reading the codex.”
Maggie blanched and shrank behind Olive.
I straightened my dress and gave myself a moment to collect my thoughts. Losing the grimoire was humiliating, but not irreversible. Aspen would be found eventually. What worried me was the feeling, sharp and cold in my gut, that Laurel had managed a final trick, one last act of defiance. The vote against me, the public declaration that Menace and Savannah’s bond was “true and just,” had been the first slap in the face. Now, even dead, she was laughing at me.
I curled my fist and drove it into the wall, relishing the shock it sent through my knuckles and the little plume of plaster dust. Teela let out a gasp. I ignored her.
“We’re leaving,” I announced. “This place is contaminated. There’s nothing left but ashes.” I gestured at the three of them, gathered like crows around a carcass. “Teela, clean up this mess. Maggie, call a car to the edge of the woods and tell them not to use the main road. Olive, you’re with me.”
We exited into the hard winter sunlight, the wind instantly cutting through the gauzy black sleeves of my dress. Olive kept her eyes on the ground as we walked.
After a stretch of silence, I decided she’d earned a crumb of explanation. “Do you know why I hated Laurel so much, Olive?”
She shook her head, braid stiff as a whip against her back.
“Laurel Waters was as powerful as I am. Maybe more so, in some ways. And she never, not once, let the Council see her true strength. She kept secrets, hid her lineage, and refused to tell a soul who fathered that pathetic little daughter. That’s what makes Aspen dangerous. She’s the only one of her kind, and we don’t know what she’s capable of.”
Olive swallowed, voice nearly lost in the wind. “Do you think the grimoire will open for her, Wyrdmother?”
“Not yet,” I said. “But it will. It always does eventually. And when it does, we need to be ready.”
We reached the car, a black town car with windows so tinted they might as well have been painted on. Maggie and Teela were already inside, whispering in low, urgent tones. I slid into the front passenger seat and watched the woods blur past as we drove.
After a while, Olive asked, “Should we go after her? Aspen, I mean.”
I smiled, all teeth. “No need. She’ll come to us. The world isn’t kind to girls like her, and she doesn’t know the first thing about hiding. We’ll put word out along the supernatural lines—let the wolves and the vamps play their games. Eventually, she’ll land in our lap.”
