And whatever that line said, it’d be up to me.
THIRTY-THREE
We couldn’t verifycomplete success unless she woke up.
One day turned into two and five and then we went over a week with no changes. Octavia remained unconscious. Elmwood remained quiet. I woke up from a nightmare I couldn’t remember every night.
“Are you expecting someone?” December asked Wilson, who sat next to her underneath a blanket with a pile of yarn between them. The chilly wind in the air bit at our cheeks, keeping us awake and briefly distracted from our collective distress.
There was a dirt cloud in the distance, a car emerging from the dust. I’d only stood on the porch because December begged me to join them. And Jonah promised to watch Octavia. Someone was at her bedside around the clock. I preferred that someone be me. The closest my head got to quiet was when I could hear her low exhales.
“I should get back.” I pushed off the porch railing, in no mood to talk to visitors. No mood to do much of anything except dig through the Guild archives and make phone callsto hunters who may know how to revive someone who’d had an experience like Octavia’s.
If Daylan couldn’t, it was highly unlikely that anyone else could. But I still called the other demon hunters twice a day in hopes of finally getting a response. I’d even considered tracking them down in person if I could stomach leaving Octavia for longer than a half an hour.
“Rae,” December said before I could open the door. “Wait.”
I opened my mouth to protest, words never leaving my tongue when I saw whose car pulled up next to our RV.
Opal stepped out first from the back seat. She wore the same block heel I’d had on when I came to the ranch. A couple of her braids hung out, framing her round cheeks, while the rest stayed tucked underneath a red scarf. She ran up to the porch, and I met her on the steps.
I hadn’t cried once since that day in the stable. Hadn’t felt like I deserved to because of how my client…how Octavia wasn’t awake.
But as soon as I smelled the amber and clover on Opal’s jacket, the tears fell. She hugged me tight against her, rubbing my back without saying a word.
“Sorry we couldn’t get here any sooner.” Dawn held back, pausing at the bottom stairs to take a proper scan of the house. Her micro-locs were in one loose braid that reached down her back. “The?—”
“Guild, yeah.” I pulled away from Opal, quickly trying to brush away the rogue tears, and stood straighter. “Honor bound.”
Dawn studied me for a second before stepping close to offer a one-armed hug.
“I’m sorry, Rae,” she whispered in my ear andpressed a quick kiss on my temple. The affection was warm, but her expression was unmoving stone.
For a second, I was ten again, wishing and praying her quiet calm would become my religion and I, its most devout follower.
“Want to run us through it?” Eve tugged on a pair of knitted gloves, barely making eye contact with me. Her silver wire-framed glasses held back her loose brown coils. She kept sniffing; the cold proving to be an opponent she’d sneer at if possible.
They were here, and somehow my head ached even more. Because for a second, everything smelled like home, but it didn’t bring me the typical nostalgic comfort. The only place I seemed fit anymore was the one place I wasn’t sure would have room for me in the coming days.
“I’ve already done that,” I said flatly. In between the day with the demon in the stable and now, I’d spoken to at least one of my sisters once a day. They used their network too, trying to find answers, but every debrief was a lesson in disappointment.
“Where we can see firsthand.” Eve raised a brow when my jaw went stiff.
“Fresh eyes.” Opal rubbed my forearm before giving me a gentle squeeze. “We could catch something new.”
I swallowed my argument and my whiny declaration that I’d turned this place inside out, along with my brain trying to figure out how to get the woman I needed more than the sun to open her eyes again.
My sisters followed me to the stable. The ground was dry and cakey. Piles of debris and clouds of dust welcomed us inside. The smell of sulfur lingered in the air, causing my nostrils to burn.
Frog and Kat had to be housed with the neighbors.None of us had the time to come into the stable to clean up again, mostly because it was a pseudo-prison.
I wiped my hands over my face as I relayed the story beat by beat. Dawn walked around the stable with her hands behind her back as I spoke. She peeked into the stalls but didn’t touch a thing.
“And this was where you exorcised it?” Eve kneeled over the pieces of the loft that were still bound with fraying rope. She poked it with the long, silver pointer she always had on her. “Where it’s trapped now?”
“Yeah,” I mumbled, picking at a hangnail. “It’s holding for now.”
The demon was trapped along with his contract inside the dark drawings Octavia’s uncle had created. His ritual had been strong and accurate.
