I want to believe I can trust her—trust all of them. But how can I? An hour ago, I thought they were just a bunch of spicy-book aficionados. All my life, they’ve hidden their true identities from me. How do I know they’re on the side of the angels?
They want information. Well, so do I. And there’s no way I’m giving up what I know until I take my shot. They’ve been here forever. Maybe they have the answers I’m after.
“I’ll tell you,” I say, looking from one of them to the next. “But first—I’m trying to find my birth parents. Do any of you know who they are? Where I came from?”
One by one, the Sinsters shake their heads, and my heart sinks. But then Mrs. Grant speaks. “My gift is to see into the past,” she says. “To see what was, but only through the eye of the beholder. I don’t know anything about your parents, Rune. But ifyouknow—if the truth is buried in your mind somewhere—then I can show you.”
I have no idea how such a thing is possible. If trying it might cook my synapses like the deep-fried Snickers bars I saw at Books, Bites, and Bedlam today. But I know one thing: if there’s the slightest possibility it’ll work, then I’m in.
“Yes,” I tell Mrs. Grant, my heart pounding so hard I can taste it. “Let’s do it. Now.”
Chapter
Thirty
The four ofus sit in a circle on the cushions. In the center, the candles flicker, their flames casting long shadows as Mrs. Grant takes my hands in hers, holding the branded one gingerly. “All right, Rune. Whatever Ella told you, we need to know. And if this is your condition, then a deal’s a deal.”
A fiery tendril sprouts from thin air, winding its way around our hands, binding them together. Gasping in shock, I try to jerk away, but the tendril winds itself faster, wrapping tight. It doesn’t burn, like the brand did, but it won’t let go, either.
“We look to the east,” Mrs. Grant says, her voice low, intent. “To the place where the sun rises, giving birth to each day.”
“To the east,” Mrs. Fontaine and Mrs. Hernandez echo in unison.
She tilts her head back, glancing upward. “We look to the north. To the place from which the snows come, washing us clean.”
“To the north,” the other Sinsters chorus.
“We look to the south. To the place from which the fire comes, burning within us.” Mrs. Grant glances downward, at our joined hands, twined together with that fiery cord.
“To the south.”
“We look to the west. To the place where the sun sinks, that it may be renewed once more.” Her head turns to the left, fixing on the doorway that leads to Mrs. Fontaine’s kitchen. I could swear I see a shadow move within it, slinking from table to stove and back again.
“To the west,” Mrs. Fontaine and Mrs. Hernandez repeat, and now their eyes are fixed on the doorway to the kitchen, too.
What the hell is in there? Was I crazy to agree to this? I try to yank my hands away again, but no dice.
“We call on the spirits, and give thanks for the powers they lend us. For we are but the vessels for their gifts.” Mrs. Grant’s face is only visible to me in profile, but I can still see the small smile that lifts her lips. “Those who have come before, be with us now. We humbly request your presence, and accept the responsibility of your summoning.”
The shadow from the kitchen sweeps through the doorway, toward us. It settles over Mrs. Grant,intoher. And then she turns her head, her eyes meet mine, and I shriek.
Her eyes have gone completely black, the whites and irises swallowed up by her pupils. What in the ever-loving?—
Mrs. Grant’s mouth opens, and a voice issues from it. It’s deep and cracked and…not hers at all. “What would you have of me?” it says.
I want to leap to my feet. To flee. But instead I say, “My name is Rune Whitlock,” summoning all of my courage. “I’m trying to find out what happened to my family. Mrs. Grant said if there was a memory buried in my subconscious…if I’d seen something…she could help me remember.”
She tilts her head, regarding me with those peculiar eyes. “Well, then. Let’s begin.”
Her hands grip mine even more tightly. And then I feel the strangest sensation…as if someone’s riffling through my mind,flipping the pages of my memory back and back, like I’m a book they’re reading from last page to first. I see me, sitting in this room with my hands in Mrs. Grant’s. The bathroom at Charlotte’s. The fair. Donovan’s office. The further back in time the memories go, the faster the pages flip. I’m graduating from college. I’m in the juvenile detention center. I’m in the yard with the monster, watching everything burn.
“Interesting,” her voice says from far away. “But not impossible.”
I want to ask her what she means. But I can’t speak. I’m caught in a whirlwind of memories, the images rippling faster and faster. I’m in middle school, with kids laughing at me. Kindergarten, my hair in a braid, clutching my lunchbox, hoping to make a friend. Four, clutching the yellow-trimmed blanket that I’ve had as long as I can remember. Three, trying to warn my babysitter that someone’s going to steal her wallet, only she won’t believe me can’t believe me and I don’t have the words. Two, sitting in a wood-paneled, windowless room, playing with some plastic toys while adults whisper behind me. One, and…
I’m standing in a light-drenched room, painted a cheery yellow, filled with plants. On the wall hangs an abstract art piece, splashed with bright, primary colors. And in a cozy rocking chair, piled with pillows, sits a beautiful woman. Her wavy, dark brown hair, so like my own, spills over her shoulders and down her back. Bars of sunlight spill across her face, highlighting a constellation of freckles that dot her cheeks. But it’s her smile, open and happy and free, that sends a wave of longing rippling through me.
I know this woman, not with my conscious mind, but on a bone-deep, visceral level. I recognize her. Everything within me gravitates toward her, like a plant long-deprived of sun.
