They exchange looks. “What does she have to do with the Botanist?”
“Sheisthe Botanist.”
The words hit Veda like waves, one conflicting emotion after the next. Anger. Grief. Helplessness. Disbelief. Each strikes harder than the last. Ruthknew. She knew and stepped in like a quasi-parent, telling Veda to live while knowing exactly who haunts her. A hand grips her knee. Veda stares at the onyx ring, then turns. Concerned blue eyes study her, lips downturned.
It’s too soon to be overwhelmed,practicality reminds her.There’s more to learn.
“How long have you known?” Veda asks, voice stronger, focused.
“That’s complicated.”
“Tell me. Everything.”
“Ariadne was at the same boarding school as Marlene. We took all the teenage Seers in. Ariadne was lonely, clung to any shred of kindness, and supposedly had a rough life prior to ending up at the school. She and Marlene were inseparable, so when Everly adopted Marlene, I adopted her. It took a while for her to open up, but when she did, Ariadne blossomed. She was smart as a whip and charming, fascinated by Omnipotent magic and creative expression. She had suchpotential.” Ruth sounds like a proud parent. “But I forgot the cardinal rule.”
“Which is?”
“The potential for anything is a thing itself.” Ruth tenses. “Marlene started opening up about the curse studies they were involved in. She said Ariadne wanted to restart them, which terrified her so badly, she didn’t want to be near her anymore. I asked more questions and learned something horrible. Seers can tear the world in two, but most of us can’t curse anyone. It takes a certain kind of arrogance, detachment, and blatant disregard for others to cast curse after curse for years on end. Marlene said, and the others later corroborated, that Ariadne was the only one fascinated instead of repulsed by the experiments they were part of. I realized then that I didn’t save Ariadne—I gave her the chance to field-test what she learned in that lab.”
Veda feels nauseous, breathless, but the weight of Hiram’s hand keeps her steady.
“I tried to help her. Therapy, distractions, everything. And for a while, it appeared to be working.” Ruth gets up and goes to the window beside them, looking outside, arms folded around her small frame. All signs of the funny, no-nonsense Ruth who bought vegetables and told Veda to start living are absent. “I still can’t believe she is this person. I now know she’s good at pretending, saying the right things to the right people, and weaponizing her trauma.”
“Ruth,” Hiram says slowly. “What aren’t you saying?”
She turns to them. “What do you know about the source of the Great Vanishing?”
Clarity makes Veda go rigid. “No.”
“Yes.” Ruth wraps her arms around herself. “Ariadne foresaw her own death. This isn’t uncommon; sometimes our visions leave clues about what is to come, but we’re not allowed to meddle, even if it means—”
“You die,” Hiram finishes, toneless.
“But Ariadne didn’t accept this. She changed minor details about her visions, and stopped them from taking place. Not once or twice. We estimate she did it at least ten times before she triggered the Vanishing event.”
Disbelief transforms into anger. Veda can no longer sit still. “Isthiswhat you’re hiding?”
“Hiding? We wereforbiddenfrom talking about it. Veda, please—”
“Don’t fucking—” She exhales harshly. “No.” Veda looks out the window, fixating on a single spot to force herself to listen.
“When you meddle with the future, it creates ripples,” Ruth explains. “Harmless if it’s done once, maybe twice, but if it continues, the ripples spread. What was once barely a shift in the water becomes a tidal wave. That’s why we’re so harsh on Seers who meddle with time. It endangers the world. Every Seer knows this. Each state’s Oracle Council banded together quickly to figure out who was doing this, and when we discovered it was her, we swooped in and she was arrested.”
Veda closes her eyes, hoping to stop her head from pounding.
Hiram is the first to speak. “Clinton—”
“He wasn’t on the Council at the time, so he wasn’t bound by the same magic.”
“Why keep this from him?How?” Veda asks, turning around. “You’re endangering yourself. You’re endangeringeveryone. She hurt thousands of people. My—” Her voice breaks. “My parentsVanishedbecause of her, and you didn’t have thedecency—”
“I couldn’t tell you, and Clinton knew far less than I did. He was on the outside looking in,” Ruth says sadly. “Mages wanted the truth behind the Vanishings buried because they did not want the public to know the amount of damage one Seer can cause, nor did they want another Seer recreating a Vanishing event. We wanted to prevent an all-out war against Seers. Everyone who knew any shred of information was forced to take an oath. Lucinda was the deponent. She cast the magical agreement, and the penalties for breaking it were harsh—deadly for the Seers involved.”
Hirman leaned forward. “Then how are you sharing this now?”
“The agreement broke upon her death. I didn’t know she made that a caveat, but I had a vision of me speaking to you as I am now, which made me realize that I could.”
“Was it guilt?” Veda hates the shake in her voice. “Did you care about me out of guilt? Because you knew ...”
