Ethan stopped walking. “You were ten years old, Delia. How did you know that demon’s name?”
I blinked. “The same way I always know.”
“Alwaysknew, though, correct? Even before that day?”
“I didn’t know I could do it before that day.”
“Well…I think my uncle did.”
The slight judgment sliced deep. I bristled. “Mordechai believed in what he was doing,” I said stiffly. “The people believed in him. If he saw something in me, then good. He was my friend from that day forward.”
“But why did he use you for such dark work?”
“I don’t know. Maybe he thought I was strong enough, even all the way back then.” We had stopped at a break in the grassy field; over a rise I’d never really noticed before. We were almost to the tree line, and here there was a shallow, rocky stream that poked out from the woods and into the paddock grasses, running for about thirty feet before it went through the fence line again. Fresh water for the horses. Had they diverted the stream or diverted the fence line to include it?
The rabbi said something again, his words poking at me, and I frowned at him. “It’s done, Rabbi Ethan. I don’t need Mordechai’s help anymore. Or yours.”
Rabbi Ethan spread his hands. The stream was at my back, and he was before me. He seemed bigger than he should be. “You are no longer plagued by Palemerious.”
“I’m not, no. And I’m weaker because of it. We were one—and now we’re not.”
Ethan’s face hardened, but it was an act, I could see. His words were too, deliberately harsh and provocative. “So you really believe you’re to blame for my uncle’s death?”
“No. I mean…” I took a faltering step to the side, my stomach cramping, and I grabbed at my waist. Around my fingers, I could see the heat rising off me, the sun seeming to bake into me, causing everything around me to shimmer. “I don’t know,” I finally said. “I didn’t mean to hurt him. I’d never have hurt him deliberately.”
“And yet—youwere hurt,” Ethan said, gesturing to my hands. “The burns will heal, but not entirely. You carried an incredible weight for a long time, Delia. These marks will be permanent proof of what you survived.”
“Oh.” I glanced down at them. “Will they, um, fade?”
He hesitated. “Eventually. Your possession was…certainly unusual. Mordechai tried, in the end, to free you. But now you have freed yourself.”
He drew in a deep, shuddering breath, lifted his hands. I bowed beneath the words he spoke, feeling them run over me and into the water, taking some of the pain away. Some of it—but not all of it. Never all of it, I suspected.
At last, he dropped his hands to my shoulders, anchoring me back to the earth. He squeezed, then stood back. “My uncle left some items for you, in his will.”
I gaped at him. “He did? His shawl?”
That made Ethan smile. “If you want his shawl, we can definitely make that happen. But I’m the executor of his will, and I need to review everything he’s designated, make sure we can honor his wishes. You understand?”
I didn’t, but I shrugged, my mind still on my image of Mordechai in his frozen-air office, wrapped in a shawl of moss green and cinnamon. “Sure—I mean, whatever’s appropriate.”
“It will take some time to make sure everything is in order. When I can, I’ll send them to you.”
He spoke some more, then, meaningless words meant to soothe and simplify a life that no longer made any sense. I didn’t mind so much, though. I didn’t mind much of anything, anymore. He left me after a while, and I drifted.
When the day swam back into focus, I was sitting at the edge of the small stream, a blanket around me, Max by my side. It felt—strange, to have him here. To have all of them, him and Claire on one side, Steve on the other. I felt like if I spoke, my mouth would still have smoke and steam puffing out at the sides, like I was some kind of teakettle dragon.
I didn’t want to leave the water’s edge, though. I’d lost something in the water, and I wouldn’t leave it.
Rabbi Ethan stood talking to Officer Hernandez, who also hadn’t left. I didn’t really remember so much when she’d come, but I thought it was a bad thing, her still being here. I looked out over the paddock, the trees. I remembered all of it. So I hadn’t really been possessed. Not in the way that most people were, where they couldn’t be held accountable for their actions, not all of them. Not the worst of them. I remembered everything. Most everything, anyway.
I didn’t quite know what to do with that.
I looked back at the stream. There’d been something of mine there.
Something I lost in the flow of the rabbi’s words. I missed it.
“Hey.” Steve finally spoke. “How, um—how do you feel?”
