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“But he said he would if you were on the right path. Right?” Adrian asked.
“Right. You’re right. So, it makes sense that all of the visions ended badly and that he never showed. I was basically shown a long ass list of what not to do.” I thought back on what the archon told me. “Eli said that with the fey gone and the Seven a mess that the seal between the planes was broken. So, we have to find a way to fix the seal before he’ll show up. It seemed like a tangent to our goal, so we just never focused on that. But maybe that’s where we went wrong.”
“I think that’s exactly where we went wrong.” Lucas was usually so quiet. When he spoke, my hope soared. “Think about it. This all started with Astaroth breaking free, and that’s what it sounds like we were focusing on in your visions. Literally how to stop him—magic against magic. How to keep him out of our plane. But there’s more to it than that. The meeting that Michael is having is about the reformation of the Seven. Who’s to take the empty spots? And—”
“Yeah. I was in one of those meetings. It was a bunch of chest beating and a whole lot of wasted time. Not to mention, Astaroth somehow showed up there, too.”
“The meeting doesn’t matter, but what did you learn in it?”
Holy shit. Lucas was on to something. “Their bond can’t be restored for five months. They need a lunar eclipse, and we can’t hold on that long. That’s why it seemed like a dead-end. Eli said we had to restore the seal and that the Seven had to be fixed, but we can’t hold Astaroth off for a few days, let alone five months. Plus, it was fey magic that formed the bond, and they’re not going to help us.”
“No. They won’t,” Chris said. “Even if they knew what was at stake. They’re too pissed at us for messing with their lives when we were outed. They’re so stubborn. So stuck in their ways. They won’t think outside of what they want and their rules.” He crossed his arms and sunk back into the couch. I wondered who he was talking about just then—the fey in general or Cosette.
“Yes, but the bond of the Seven is the key,” Lucas said, his voice had a quiver of hope. He was on to something, but I was missing it. “Eli isn’t going to show up until you find a way arou
nd all of that and restore the seal between the planes.”
I crushed the plastic bottle in my hands. “That’s an impossible task. Maybe more impossible than beating Astaroth in a fist fight.” We were so screwed.
“I know,” Lucas said. “That’s why we weren’t in a rush for the meeting, but something needs to happen. We’re not going to defeat Astaroth until we figure out a way around the rules. We’re just as stuck in our ways as the fey. So, we need to be thinking bigger.”
I turned to Claudia. “Can we force a lunar eclipse magically?”
“I don’t think so. I mean…” She twirled the end of her braid in her fingers as she thought. “I’ve never heard of such thing, so I don’t think it’s possible, but I could do some digging. I wish that we’d manage to scrounge some of the books on the compound before it was burned. We didn’t have a library as large as the one in St. Ailbe’s or the one in Peru, but every house had books. The books on craft at the school aren’t great. And without better information…” She slid past Lucas to sit in her seat and grabbed her phone. “I’ll see what I can dig up online but it might not be doable.”
I got up and started pacing where Claudia had left off. “Okay. So we have to find balance. And the Seven is broken. So…” I froze. Oh, shit. Lucas wasn’t the only one with an idea. And it wasn’t something I’d tried in my visions.
“You’ve thought of something you didn’t try in your visions?” Chris asked, as if he was reading my mind.
I nodded.
“We’re all ears,” Adrian said. “What’s your idea?”
“Maybe I’d failed because we were too focused on trying to fix what was broken instead of trying something totally different.” I looked at Lucas. “What if we made a new Seven that wasn’t the Seven?”
Lucas frowned. “I’m not sure I’m following.”
“The Seven is old news. Done. Past tense. Instead of trying to fix the bond that the Seven had, what if we made something new? Something similar but better. Stronger. Something we wouldn’t need a lunar eclipse for.”
“I…” Lucas was quiet as he thought. “I guess I’ve never thought about abandoning the the Seven entirely. I just…” He pressed his lips together. “The Alphas are not going to like it at all.”
I agreed, but that shouldn’t stop us. “Who gives a shit what they like? We’re talking about stopping the apocalypse. If the Alphas had paid attention and maybe, I don’t know, not killed Ferdinand without a way to replace him immediately, or not let Donovan leave, then we wouldn’t be in this position. They’re going to have to think outside of the box with this one.”
“And if they can’t?” Lucas said, a little too quietly.
“Screw them.” I spat it out and I meant it. “We don’t need any of them to approve what we do or how we stop the apocalypse.”
“You might grow to regret going against the Alphas.” Lucas’ voice was a low rumble and I knew I’d pissed him off a little, but I didn’t care.
“Maybe, but at least we’ll be alive.” And at the end of the day, that’s all that mattered. If the Alphas had a problem with how we save the world, well then, that was on them.
Fourteen
The more we sat and talked, the more complicated everything got. Figuring out how to do a spell as big as the Seven without drawing Astaroth in and without the fey seemed insanely impossible. We were landing soon, and still didn’t have any idea how to make it happen.
This was beyond no bueno. I wanted to have our next step in place so we could start fixing this whole mess when we hit the ground, but so far, we’d yet to agree on anything.
“You’re still going to need a fey,” Mr. Dawson said. We’d Skyped him a while ago, but the only thing he’d done was shoot down my plan and anything anyone else came up with.
