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“What happens if you shift?” she asks. “Why does it worry you so much?”
“I for one don’t know how to shift back,” I say.
“Maybe Jason would know…” She turns toward him. “Right?”
Jason is standing by the door, hands in his pockets. His gaze is bleak. “I shift once in a while, when the urge grows too strong. When the moon is red, for instance, I have little control over myself. I shift and wait for the moon to wane to shift back to human. Sometimes… Sometimes I don’t know when I’ll shift back.”
“So that’s our worry?” Emrys says, settling back against the headboard of my bed, drawing a leg up to his chest. “That we’ll be stuck in animal form for a few days? Who the hell cares?”
Jason’s hands clench. “Seriously, demon. You’re an idiot if you don’t see the problem.”
Emrys only frowns harder.
“Shifting is only one of the manifestations of the magic,” I say. “Right, Sin?”
Sindri nods. “The energy of our element would flow through us. We’ll be conduits. Live wires. We could be dangerous to others. And that’s if we don’t attack any students while in beast form.”
“Still,” Emrys says, “I don’t see—”
“These surges,” Sindri interrupts. “Someone is causing them. Someone or something. As conduits, we’d be opening a gate to these surges. Without control, we could destroy cities. Countries.”
“There is a reason demonblood was accepted so quickly,” I say. “It’s not only controllable, but it manages the elemental force in the magical races, and we are the purebloods. The best conduits available.”
“So who is doing that?” Mia glances around at all of us. “Someone shot those arrows at you, bringing down your demonblood magic and letting your elemental magic rise. Someone or something is causing the elemental magic surges that affect you so much.”
“What causes these magic swells could be anything from a waking volcano on a ley line to a magic source breaking through to the surface to a dormant well of power under the melting ice returning to life.” I shrug.
“Or aVasilissa,” Sindri says. “A powerful witch who bears the mark of power.”
“A mark? A birthmark? What would that look like?” she breathes, her voice very small.
“Usually it’s a crown,” I say, and she visibly relaxes.
“Of course.” She laughs softly and I have to wonder what’s going through her mind. “So what about the arrow? Any clues?”
Jason wanders over to me to look at the arrow in my hand. “No marks,” he says. “I don’t recognize the style.”
“Emrys, you said it looked to you like the arrows of the demon police.”
“Lemme see.” He snaps his fingers. “Jax. The arrow. Fetch.”
“Very funny,” Jason growls. “Fetch it yourself.”
Emrys chuckles and gets up from the bed—very slowly, I notice, pressing a hand briefly to his chest where the wound is, and comes to sit beside me on the settee. He takes the arrow from me, turns it over in his hands.
“So? Any grand epiphany?” I ask.
“No fucking epiphany.” Emrys frowns. “But I was wrong. The police arrows have nine notches on top, for the nine circles of hell. But this one only has five.”
“Well, fuck.” I stretch my arms over my head. “I’d say it’s a relief that the police aren’t after us, but not knowing who is doesn’t feel much better.”
“Have you done anything to upset people lately?” Mia asks, and there is something off about her expression as if… As if she’s detached, distant, not really here.
As if she’s hiding her emotions.
“Upset people?” Sindri snorts. “Have you met us?”
“Maybe you’ve done something particularly despicable,” she says. “Something so terrible someone took offense and decided to make you pay.”
