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“How many acolytes are there at present?” Jonas asked.
“It varies,” Rhea said, looking at me. “Most of the court is composed of junior initiates, who have just been brought in—young girls who have been identified with unusual promise. And senior initiates, that’s most of us, who have training but carry none of the power. The adepts are only a small group, chosen from the most gifted of the senior initiates. After Myra’s death, there were only five.”
I just looked at her for a moment, sure the state of my head right now was messing with me. But no. I must be hearing things. “Come again?”
“Did I—was something not clear?” she asked, starting to look worried.
“I really hope so,” I said tightly. “You said the senior initiates don’t carry the Pythian power. So by implication . . . the adepts do?”
She nodded. “They have to, for training purposes. They all receive basic instruction in the Pythian arts, and the one who masters them the best is often selected as the heir. It also allows for circumstances when an heir dies or is deposed. There has to be someone else who can take over, who has been trained. They are also available to help the Pythia, in times of need.”
“In times of need?” I looked at Jonas.
He didn’t say anything, but he took off his glasses and polished them, despite the fact that he’d just done that thirty seconds ago.
“If a mission is more hazardous than she feels would be prudent to handle alone,” Rhea explained.
I continued to look at Jonas.
“Yes, well,” he said briskly. “We already knew there was a problem with the court, thanks to Ms. Silvanus’ testimony—”
“Jonas.”
“You had enough on your plate as it was, Cassie! There was no reason to add more—”
“There was no reason to tell me there’s a whole group of Myras running around?”
“It is hardly that,” he argued. “The acolytes only have a small fraction of the heir’s power, barely enough for training—”
“Jonas.”
“And Myra was a traitor. Until now, there has been no reason to believe the rest of the court was the same, much less that they would attack their own coven—”
“Jonas!” He stopped, and looked at me. And something on my face must have registered, because he stopped whatever it was he’d been about to say. “Never keep something like this from me again. Never.”
I got up and shoved through the French doors, out onto the balcony. Jonas didn’t follow me, which was fortunate. I honestly don’t know what I’d have done if he had.
It had been this way my whole life: people keeping things from me. Sometimes for what they thought were good reasons, sometimes, most times, because knowledge was power, and the less I had of the former, the less I’d be able to challenge them for the latter. Tony, the Circle, the senate, Mircea . . . someone was always working to keep me in the dark.
But there were things in the dark that could bite you if you didn’t know they were there. If you couldn’t avoid them because you didn’t even know they existed. Knowledge wasn’t just about power; it was about survival, mine and that of everyone who depended on me.
And I was heartily sick of the dark.
Evelyn came out onto the balcony. She didn’t say anything. But her wrist was resting on the railing, not far from where my hand was clenching on it convulsively. And in hers . . .
It had been a wand, I thought, watching her twirl it expertly, back and forth, between her fingers.
Our eyes met.
“I think it’s time the girls and I were going,” she said. And then she just looked at me, gray eyes into blue.
I licked my lips.
“I’ll walk you out,” I said hoarsely.
Chapter Thirty-four
The mansion was dark and quiet when we shifted in to the front hall of the Pythian Court. London is seven hours ahead of Vegas, which would make it somewhere around midnight, and I had jumped us back as far as I could. Which wasn’t very damned far, because carrying five has a cost, and it is high.
