I frowned. “I don’t think he’d like being called an inferior animal. He’s majestic. A beautiful animal,” I admitted, although my fondness for him may have made me biased.
“A raven isn’t an inferior animal. They can talk and hold a grudge like a gangsta. They’re beautiful, too,andcan fly. A group of them are called an unkindness,” Amelia touted. “In comparison, wolves. Pack? Meh. Fur, growling, and pack dynamics, that’s all they got.”
Her love of ravens was the source of teasing on numerous occasions, but there was no need for wolves to catch a stray with her insults. She seemed more impressed by their ability to hold generational beef than the speaking or their gothic persona of unkindness.
“I missed you so much.” The teasing and earnestness in my voice only confirmed how undeniably accurate Cirrian was. Amelia’s death would have ruined me and prevented me being in the right headspace to even consider doing what was necessary to unlock my magic. It had been years since my parents’ deathand there was still an empty space in my heart for them. I felt their absence daily. Amelia and Walden were a salve for my heartache, but the hollowness remained. I hugged Amelia. She returned it, making soft circles on my back, and I relaxed in the comfort.
19
The delivery driver had a quiet look of judgment, similar to the one I directed at Amelia when we ordered the food. I held on to it as I set out the smorgasbord from three different restaurants on the kitchen table. Wings and fries, mac and cheese and fried green tomatoes, pepper steak and fried rice. I side-eyed the large salad and serving of steamed broccoli taunting us at the center of the table.
“Really?” I teased.
“We need our vegetables.” She grinned. “And plates.” She flicked a look at the cabinets. “And bowls.”
As soon as I’d placed the dishes on the table, Amelia grabbed the mac and cheese, dividing half of our favorite comfort food from the local soul food restaurant that I’d deemed the best in the city, into small bowls.
“Eat this first,” she urged. Plopping into chairs, we took a bite and sighed at its creamy savoriness.
Between bites, I attempted to discuss the situation, but Amelia interrupted me with a shake of her head and her fork, directing me back to my food.
I didn’t think there was any way she could finish it. I was wrong. With my help we devoured nearly all of it. Not only was I sleep deprived, I was famished.
After eating, we returned to the living room and settled deep into the sofa, our legs crossed and facing each other while we spoke in more detail about everything that had occurred. I even revealed the grimoire to her. She’d examined it, frowning at the long-forgotten language of the script. We seemed to share the same thought about getting Cirrian to translate it all. It was unlikely that he would, but I stored it away to ask him later, leaning into the mindset that I wouldn’t know until I asked.
As I continued disclosing everything, Amelia shifted in her seat, chewing her bottom lip before releasing it, leaving red teeth imprints. Running her hands over her face as if she needed to smooth out a frown. Her expression cycled through an array of emotions that I’d felt over the past few days. It finally landed on confusion. She fixed me with a long look. Through her sequence of emotions, I wondered if she liked the vampires more—at least Darby and Corrine.
“Are you ready to tell me about the weirdness with the vampires?” From the small scowl that peaked then faded at the mention of them, I suspected she felt the same about them.
“What?”
“I’ve pretended too long. We’re in this together so I need to know everything. No more edited versions, okay?” She frowned. “Kara, we’ve known each other for over twenty years. Do you think I don’t know your tells? Your face is more expressive than you realize, and the only reason the vampires can’t detect it is because they’re too far removed from their humanity. You do this”—she pressed her lips into a bow—“and this with your eyes.” Her eyes moved slowly from side to side in an avoidance of eye contact that I was sure was far more exaggerated than mine.
“Those are the expressions you make every time you tell your job origin story. You’ve told your version enough that the signs are now subtle. But I remember the first time you told me, and I knew you were leaving a lot out. I’ve waited for you to feel comfortable telling me. But that time never seemed to come.” There was an undercurrent of hurt in her voice. “Why are the vampires drawn to you? Is it because you’re an ashinwa?”
“Wolves, too,” I added. “Well, one wolf. Maybe two.” I’d left out the situation with Terran because it didn’t seem relevant, and as she was being hit with a surge of new information, I thought it best to edit. I was wrong. So I told her about the situation with Terran in great detail.
I told her everything that took place that night, including me reanimating, or rather performingda vitam, on Raynard.
“Withholding this information had nothing to do with you and everything to do with me,” I explained. “It scared me, and every time I wanted to tell you, I kept hearing your mother’s words: ‘You may regret saving this life.’”
She grinned. “I don’t care if your magic burns this world to the ground, I’ll stand with my extinguisher doing my best to mitigate it and making sure no one ever knows it was you.”
“An accomplice to world destruction. That’s true loyalty. Nice.”
“Not loyalty. Love.”
I nodded. “Same.”
“You made a bargain with a demon and you were willing to be changed to a vampire. What else do you call that?” No matter how much she tried, she couldn’t keep the derision out of her tone at the mention of vampires.
There was an unnerving shift in the atmosphere. “Repeat what happened when they attempted to locate the curser,” she asked, then listened intently while I described the mist that formed into links and wrapped around her coven, sending theminto choking fits before they were thrashed against the wall, rendering Rachel and another witch without breath and the twins unconscious.
Amelia went into a reverie that required me calling her name several times before she answered. She took a long pull from her glass.
Her glower was replaced by her massaging her temples and closing her eyes. She stayed that way for a long time, and when she relaxed, she folded her hands into her lap. She blinked at tears, but a few managed to escape. “This is my fault?” She spoke in a hoarse whisper, sinking into her sigh. “I’m glad our magic is collected when we die to prevent it compounding and making us too strong to be reined in,” she said. “Vina should have been reined in a long time ago. Great magical ability doesn’t forge gratitude, it just fuels the lust for more.” Shaking her head, she started to gnaw at one of her nails. Usually, I’d give her a reminder or gently pull it from her mouth, but her eyes had glazed over and she’d sunk into despair. And abandoned referring to Vina as her mother.
“There wasn’t a time after the incident that she didn’t bring you up when we met. No matter the topic, she slipped in questions about you. I assumed it was just simple interest about the draveth attack.”
