Secrets abounded, and I was keeping most of them.
“She is difficult. I told you we should bring her in and let the council have a round at her,” Davin said. “She thinks she’s something special. But she’s nothing but a washed-up divorcee. She’s only here because she had nowhere else to go and nowhere to hide. I heard the bank has her address now. It won’t be long before they take everything, including that house of her gran’s. Terrible pity that, but once they have everything she owns, she’ll be forced to move on.”
My eyes shot to him, his words slamming the final pieces of the puzzle into place. I was the queen of guessing, and I had a real doozy to drop. “You helped Alan, didn’t you?”
His smile said it all and the rage that shot through me repulsed Roderick’s magic as if I’d taken a stick and walloped him a good knock to the noggin. He stumbled back from me. “Dav, I don’t think you should piss her off.”
The third council member crept closer to Roderick. “What is she?”
“I don’t know,” Roderick said.
“She’s only got the knives that Crash gave her. And those won’t hurt me,” Davin sneered. “Fae magic is nowhere near as strong as that of a true mage. Shall I show you how it’s done, Roderick?”
Roderick cleared his voice. “I don’t think you should push her. If you do, you’ll be dealing with something other than fae magic in the form of knives.”
I didn’t even look at the other council members. All I could see was Davin offering Alan a deal that would free him from any debt, from his wife, from any responsibility whatsoever. A deal meant to destroy me.
I clamped my hand around Davin’s wrist. He looked down at where I was hanging onto him.
“Take your hand off me, hag.”
“Hag?” I whispered the word as something within me clicked open wide like a treasure chest letting me see a hint of what I was capable of, a glimpse of the possible. I called the magic to me, feeling for the first time since I’d landed in Savannah that there was more to me than the “washed-up divorcee” some people like him saw. Gran had told me as much, but this was the moment I knew down to my bones it was true.
The Silver Lady appeared behind Davin, solidifying until she looked as alive and real as I did. My rage appeared to be feeding her strength—lines of magic or maybe energy spooled between us, connecting us, as silvery as the name I’d given her.
Roderick let out a low muttered curse and pinned himself against the far wall—apparently, he could see what I was doing. The third faceless one that still gave me the willies, even in this rage high, watched with great interest. I didn’t like the feelings that swirled around him, but he wasn’t my focus. Not today.
The Silver Lady held her chin high, watching me and waiting for me to speak. “I think you should stay with him,” I said. “Keep him company. Don’t let him sleep. Let him know what a hag can truly do.”
Her smile was slow and wicked, and I found myself answering it.
Davin’s face paled as he yanked out of my hold. The Silver Lady put a hand on his shoulder and sunk into him. He shivered, and sweat broke out on his forehead that I was sure was cold as ice.
“You will come before the council before the week is up,” said Roderick’s voice.
I found myself giving him a mock curtsy. “I have no idea where you losers meet, so you’ll have to give me the address.”
Davin shivered and jumped when he looked into the shadows of the hall. The lights flickered and the hallway went dark. He squealed, high-pitched like a little child. “Roderick, Bruce, get some light in here.”
“You’re a mage, why don’t you turn your own damn light on?” I said, feeling the ghosts in the walls, knowing they were the ones messing with the lights.
“Because that is not where his abilities lie,” Roderick said from within the dark hall. I assumed that Bruce was the one whose face was sliding all over the damn place.
Roderick’s hand glowed a light purple, and flames prettier than they had any right to be lit his outstretched palm. His eyes turned to me. “I will come gather you for the meeting when they decide to speak with you. It was lovely to meet you, Breena O’Rylee, granddaughter of Celia.” Formal, he was being super formal, and I didn’t like it. Bruce said nothing, which I liked even less.
Call me suspicious, but he was going to be trouble, Mr. You-can’t-see-my-face-no-matter-what-angle-you-look-at-me-with.
“I would say it’s been a slice, but I’d rather not lie.” I stood there waiting while the three council members reached the stairwell and headed down, Roderick all but holding Davin together. Bruce stopped in the doorway to look at me.
I put my hands on my hips. “What are you looking at, No Face?”
He might have growled at me, but I wasn’t sure because I couldn’t see what the hell his face was doing. And then he was gone too.
I didn’t ask why they didn’t take the elevator. Maybe they (correctly) assumed the ghosts had control of it. The second they stepped into the stairwell the hallway flooded with the ghosts that had been hiding in that one room.
“I’ll be back,” I said to them. Because whatever the heck was going on was surely tied up with the ghosts in the Marshall House. I just had to find a way to discuss it with them. And I knew the person to ask how best to go about it.
Louis from the Hollows Group was about to get a visit from me.
8
I hadn’t been to the cemetery where the Hollows Group trained since everything had gone down with the O’Seans. After I’d faced down O’Sean Senior (His first name had been Patrick. I’d learned that after I’d killed him). Since I’d sort of died and had come back after a chitchat with Robert as he would have been in life. Which meant I’d only been back once after the whole Sarge-firing-me-while-under-a-spell debacle.
All in all, those were great reasons not to go back. But the thing was, Louis, the resident necromancer, was one of the mentors. If anyone could help me understand the whole ghost episode in the Marshall House, it was him. Maybe he’d even have some insight into the book of black spells. What was it with that line Silver moon is the time for the demon skin to be found, and bound, and used to be bidden?
It circled around my brain in a way I didn’t like.
At least, I was hoping Louis knew something. Because if he didn’t, I didn’t know where to turn to next.
I patted my bag on my hip. I’d stopped back at Gran’s house to find Feish freaking out that she’d left me behind in a room full of ghosts.
I’d calmed her quickly and suggested that perhaps she and Kinkly—who lived in the big oak tree out front—should stay in the garden and do some weeding even though it was after dark. Because I heard things going on upstairs.
Jaysus lordy, Suzy and Eric were still going at it? I didn’t want to know. I really, really didn’t want to know.
A small smile tripped over my lips as I imagined Gran walking in on them. Just floating through the wall like she was prone to do. Yeah, I was going to do some serious apologizing to my gran after this.
I blinked and shook myself as I drew close to the cemetery gate that led into the Hollows. In the distance, I heard yelling, and my hand dropped to the knife strapped to my thigh. But the shouting was from Eammon, and it took me a moment to register that he was barking at the remaining recruits to move their sorry asses faster.