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"All good," Theo said, as though reassuring himself. He clapped Luca on the shoulder. "C'mon, man, cheer up, it'll be fine. I've lost my keys tons of times." He pulled the door open and followed Luca out into the night. "You just have to retrace your steps."
Luca's grouchy grunt was the last sound I heard before the cabin door closed softly behind them.
It was oddly quiet, without Theo's steady voice interspersing English with Latin, without Luca's intermittent commentary from the floor. Julian read in a low voice, in English only, for it seemed he was able to translate the book's words much faster than Theo. Or perhaps he had read it so many times already that he knew it by heart. Julian had read the spell he'd performed out loud three times already, but so far nothing in the book sounded as though it could negate what he had done. If only it could simply be undone, like—
Theo's laughing voice. You just have to retrace your steps.
I gasped softly, my spine snapping straight. My heart began to pound.
Julian looked up sharply. "What is it?"
"Shh," I hissed, holding up a hand. "Shut up a second."
My eyes were wide, my pulse thumping in my ears. Why wouldn't it work? Only a few minutes ago Theo had read a spell to bind a lover, followed immediately by the spell to unbind. They were mirrors of each other, the steps performed in reverse order; even the illustrations had been carefully redrawn, but inverted.
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Julian take a small breath. His eyes stayed on me, dark and as piercing as daggers.
"Change her back," I whispered.
Silence. I heard his soft intake of breath, saw the way every muscle in his body tensed. When he spoke, the single word was barely audible. "What?"
I turned to face him, my jaw set, my hands clenched, the ring on my finger hot against my skin. "Change her back," I repeated, louder this time. "You turned her into this. Reverse it. Change her back to an angel. Undo it."
Julian stared at me, dismay creeping into his expression. "River—"
"No," I said, cutting him off. I stood up. "Don't you dare say you don't know how. You did it once, you can do it again."
He was shaking his head. "That ceremony—it cannot be—it's not possible, River. It's not."
"Bullshit," I spat. Something hot and rageful started to burn in my chest. "None of this is possible. This—" I jabbed a finger at the book—"is an entire book of impossible. That I'm standing here possessed by a demon is impossible." A suspicion took root deep inside me. "Where did this book even come from? Who wrote these spells?"
He froze.
"Turn to the back," I said quietly.
He must have seen something in my expression, because he didn't try to argue again. Slowly, he opened the book to the back pages. They were blank.
"You hadn't gotten around to filling them out yet, I see," I said. The burning in my left hand started to feel as though it was spreading up my arm, and I flexed my fingers against the pain.
His eyes were steady on mine, not fearful, but guarded and mistrustful. "Lilin," he said softly.
"That's not my name," I growled.
My chest was aflame, my skin scalding.
He stood, slowly, one hand reaching for me. "River," he said, gentler this time. He took a step forward.
"I told you," I snarled, "that's not my name!"
I felt his hand on my arm, and then everything went dark.
32
"River."
I'm here.
"River."
