“And?” Will asks.
“She’s with Mamá.”
I’m stomping through the snow, uncaring of how much noise I’m making. Dead brush crunches beneath my feet. Twigs snap, the sound like a whip in my mind. The witches will surely hear my approach, but I don’t care. I want answers.
“Ava, think about what you’re doing,” Will says.
He struggles to keep up with me. I’m familiar with this frozen tundra, but he’s not. He trips over fallen branches and crashes into tree banks. He’s been trying to calm me down since I broke our circle and began rushing over here. But I can’t be tamed.
“I want answers, Will.”
“I know, and I do too, but think about this,” Will warns. “Think about the timing of this. We just battled another coven, and we’re outnumbered. We’re weak from the spell.”
But I don’t care about any of that. I just need to see them. I need to know what happened, why they lied—if Liv was ever missing to begin with. Questions circulate in my mind, and it’s all I can think about right now. I don’t fear for my safety; I fear for theirs.
“I need to know why,” I say, repeating myself.
Why would Mamá lie to me? Why would she make me think Liv was taken? She knows Liv was important to me. Was this just some cruel game? Did she think it was funny? Was she testing my loyalties? Was it Liv’s idea, or was she an innocent bystander in the witches’ messed-up games? I have more questions than answers, and that just frustrates me more.
“Maybe they already found her, and that’s why she is with them,” Will suggests.
“She didn’t seem like she was just saved from her abductors,” I say. I smack a low-hanging tree branch as I pass it. A flurry of snow cascades around us, falling to the ground. “In fact, she seemed just fine. Now tell me, Will, if you were just held captive for two full days, would you act like nothing happened? I think not.”
“Ava, this is suicide!” Will says, his voice frantic.
“Then wait here,” I say. “I’ll only be a minute.”
Straight ahead, I see Mamá’s house. The forest brushes up against her backyard. The only thing separating the two worlds—the forest and her home in Darkhaven—is a short, wooden fence.
I make my way toward the gate and stare at the house I used to find so homey. I liked that Mamá never painted the wooden planks Papá used to build our home. I thought it was sweet, like she was secretly always waiting for him to return to us. It makes me sick to think of the woman he would have come home to. She’s nothing like the person he fell in love with.
I peer into the windows, squinting to see shadows inside the rooms. It’s too dark inside to see anything clearly. The house looks empty, but I know she’s inside, waiting for me. If this was just a test or some sick, twisted game, then she expected me to figure it out eventually. She knows me well enough to trust I would come here for answers.
I open the gate, the creak from weather-worn hardware announcing my presence, and step past the threshold and into her backyard. Will is beside me, but he scans the surrounding woods. He’s certain more witches are coming for us, and he might be right. But I can’t think about that now.
“Hola, hija,” Mamá says.
She steps out of the shadows, where she was waiting, hiding.
“Mamá,” I say in response.
“Sabía que vendrías,” she says, confirming my earlier thoughts. She was expecting me to return home.
“And what did you plan to say to me when I came back?” I ask. I narrow my gaze at her, hoping my anger is evident.
“Liv was not missing, mija,” Mamá says. “She was never in danger.”
“You lied to me. But why?” I ask, shocked my coven would stoop so low. “What was the point? Was this all just a game to you?” Faking the disappearance of one of their own was pathetic. They should be above such trivial, childish pursuits.
“Esto no es un juego,” she says. “After you came to our aid so naturally when the vampires attacked, I knew you would come again. You just needed motivation.”
“What do you mean ‘this is not a game’? What’s going on?” My skin is prickling, warning me of incoming danger.
I glance at Will, who’s shaking from nerves or hunger or both. He must feel it too. Something is…off, not right. He stares into the distance, noticing what I was too distracted to see.
We are surrounded. While I was confronting Mamá, the other witches encircled us. Standing in their crosshairs, I have no choice but to wait for their attack. I’ll admit, I might not have been on friendly terms with my coven, but they’re the last witches I expected to actually hunt me down.
“I had to lie, mija,” Mamá admits. “It was the only way to get you here.”
“And now what? What happens now?” I ask, desperately trying to sound stronger than I am. I’m terrified, and I don’t want the witches to sense it.
Are you going to actually kill me, Mamá? Your own daughter?
“Now you come home,” she says.
Chapter Thirteen
I wish I could say I never expected my demise to be at the hands of my own mother, but even I know that to be a lie. Even so, that doesn’t make me stop wondering how Mamá could betray me like this. From the beginning, she’s hated what I’ve become, but is her animosity, her bitterness toward my new life, really enough to make her feel death is my only way back to salvation?
Time slows as the witches draw nearer. It’s almost as if they move in slow motion. I know they’re not. It’s all in my head, and briefly, I pretend everything is in my head. I’m not standing in Mamá’s backyard. I’m not facing the witches in what will surely end in a battle. I’m not risking death or fighting those I once loved. I’m in bed at the manor, and everything is okay.
Until it’s not anymore.
Frowning, I scan the crowd. There are so many faces I don’t recognize. I’m not surprised Mamá asked the other covens to aid her in this ridiculous, spiteful pursuit, but I am shocked so many side with her.
They dive into a world of unknowns, not caring to understand the truth or accept the half-blood creatures Will and I claim to be. They will not have promises of peace and prosperity, and because of this, we will never escape war and bloodshed. I understand that now. I understand that it is either them or me.
When I look at Mamá and stare into her eyes, I do not see sorrow. There is no regret, no anguish. She does not mourn her daughter. She looks at me with disgust, with shame. Am I really so far gone in her eyes? She mourns who I was without considering that which we’ve gained.
My throat tightens as the witches begin their chants. I inhale sharply, holding my breath as I consider our options. Everything in my life results in death and destruction, yet I can never get used to fighting to the death like we’re gladiators.
Will is beside me. He grabs on to my hand, sliding his fingers to thread them between mine. I stand as a united front with a stranger. He does not know me, but he risked his life to save another. I search for her, wondering if she knows the pain she’s caused.