They watch me for a tense moment and then give the smallest of nods.
“Yes!” I hiss. “Asset Three: CJ’s telempathy.”
“Asset Number Four,” Tolliver says. “Elle’s leadership.”
I bite back a grin, certain a blush is spreading across my cheeks.
“And my accents,” I say.
CJ snorts. “I’ll give you fifty bucks if you don’t do a single accent on this job.”
“What? The accents are the best part!”
Crowlene cackles and ruffles her feathers, and I choose to believe she’s agreeing with me.
CJ pulls a fifty out of their wallet and snaps it taut a few times.
I sigh and reach into my own pocket, and frown.
My hand has reached a folded-up piece of paper. It takes me a moment to place it: the paper I pulled from Rook’s pocket when I was trying to grab his mask. With everything else going on, I’d forgotten about it.
I pull it free and open it. My eyes go wide, and I can’t even speak. A first, I know. But all I can do is lay the page out flat on the table for the others to see.
Tolliver gasps. CJ’s eyes widen. Ezra stares slack-jawed.
It’s the missing page of the grimoire.
Thirty-Seven
Scorch marks run along the edge of the page where hellfire had been used to remove it from the codex.
Hellfire, which can only be used by demons. Like Rook.
I don’t know how he did it with all of us laser-focused on the grimoire, but he’s obviously sneakier than I gave him credit for. I mean, I guess we already figured that out with the whole conning-me thing. I shouldn’t be surprised he had tricks hidden up his sleeves.
“The rest of the spell?” Ezra asks.
“Or a new one,” CJ suggests.
“Whatever it is,” I say, “if Rook didn’t want us to have it, it must be incredibly dangerous.”
Something about this feels momentous, like a key just within my reach, a word on the tip of my tongue.
I grin. “We have twelve hours to translate this. And…go.”
It takes fourteen and half hours to translate, but who’s counting?
(I am. I’m counting.)
The losses of Poppy and Rook hang over the entire process. Luckily, we have a better handle on how the writing system works, two people who speak ancient languages, and the cherry on top—since the page was torn from the book, it’s no longer under whatever protection spell kept us from copying it, so we can enter the Latin straight into Google Translate.
Once Tolliver finishes writing out the final translation onto the page, I take it from him and stand in front of CJ’s fake fireplace, clearing my throat. I try not to be too theatrical—that was Poppy’s thing—but come on, this is exciting.
“ ‘This is the solemn rite of banishment,’ ” I recite, and pause.
Energy pulses through the room, and I feel the rush of the last piece of a con falling into place.
“ ‘One soul, blessed with a mysterious gift that flows through the marrow, first must gather the due elements: a single hair or drop of blood from the one to be returned, withered leaves collected under the waning moon, the essence of ash and rot distilled at the witching hour, a sprig of cypress harvested at dusk’…”
