“Do you have time to come and visit for a few hours tonight?”
Mrs. Trent hesitated. “What for?”
“Hold on, I’m going to put you on speakerphone,” my mom said. “Thomas wants to ask you a question.”
“You of course are aware that there are magical objects out there that can enhance powers.” My father’s baritone voice came over the phone, and somehow it reminded me of his stern yet caring ways that I missed more than I could say. “Have you ever found one where if you add another’s energy, the object can hold and store it?”
Mrs. Trent frowned. “You two aren’t experimenting with wild magic again, are you?”
“Now, now, Vanessa,” Dad said. “There is so much we can get done with—”
There was a noise in the background, like a door shutting and someone shouting. “Hold on,” Mom said.
“What? What have you done?” Uncle James’s voice came in angry and panicked. “Do you realize what’s happening?”
“James, calm down.”
“Calm down? Calm down?” Uncle James’s voice rose. “You have no idea. I know what you were doing earlier today. And now… this is a total mess.”
“Uh, Vanessa, I have to go,” Mom said quietly. And then the phone went dead.
At the same time, the vision ended.
Lizzy looked at me. “Oh hex, Darcy, your uncle.”
“Mrs. Trent told me that my uncle had agreed to have me marry her daughter as the price for her staying silent. When I refused, she took matters into her own hands.” My voice was flat. “That was when I suspected.” Uncle James, the man who’d taken over when I wouldn’t. When I’d been obsessed with finding the source of Moonrot and my parents’ killer.
“I need to check with Georgiana. She said she was with Uncle when she found out that my parents were killed,” I muttered.The thing was, I hadn’t spoken to Georgiana yet about my theory of our parents being murdered. I hadn’t wanted to tell her until I knew for sure, and even when I did know for sure, I couldn’t bring myself to tell her until I found the culprit.
“Could Mrs. Trent be misleading you?” Lizzy asked. “We heard your uncle’s voice, but what if it’s distorted? She could be showing the truth but still leading us to the wrong conclusion?”
“My parents said his name.”
“Was that possibly altered also?”
“I don’t know. Maybe.” I held up the piece of mirror to examine it while I thought about the wording of my deal with Mrs. Trent. “Yes, it would work within the terms of our agreement. But what’s her motive for doing so?”
“To push your uncle aside so you’ll put more trust and power in Rosalie’s hands?”
I sighed. “Being heir to the throne complicates things so much.”
The driver serenading us continued his melody, coming to a high note. As if on cue, little rose petals began falling from the ceiling. One landed on Lizzy’s nose, and she brushed it away in annoyance. “Seriously? How is this romantic?” She refocused on me. “Maybe it’s not your uncle. We don’t know what he was angry about or what he did afterward. Maybe he’s just the next stop on our journey.”
I wanted to believe that, but the evidence was mounting against him. My uncle saw my parents that night and kept it hidden from everyone. He’d been angry with my parents and they’d quarreled over something. Mrs. Trent had made a deal with my uncle, because he obviously didn’t want any of it to get out.
I pulled out my phone and opened the family app.
“What are you doing?” Lizzy asked, trying to glance over my shoulder.
“Checking my family’s flight logs. They’re always updated here, and I can check them when I want.” I brushed away a rose petal that landed on my screen and looked over the entries. “Here.” I pointed at the line. “It says my uncle left from Wyoming at 4:15 p.m. Mountain Time and arrived in New York at 10:15 p.m. Eastern. With a two-hour time zone difference, that means he went straight to New York. There’d be no time for a layover.” Relief moved through me. “He couldn’t have killed Clara Ashcombe.”
“Does that mean he didn’t kill your parents for sure?”
I frowned. “No, it doesn’t. What if we were off about my parents’ and Clara Ashcombe’s murder being connected?”
“That’s possible.”
There were protective magical stones placed around Pemberley to keep the royal family safe while inside the home. However, after doing a few magical tests on them, it seemed the stone’s power had weakened over time. And a good glamour spell could trick them as to the killer’s intentions. Few knew that. Did uncle?
