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I head to my own vehicle, my mind racing with all this new information—with all the old.
Willow may be in danger, but I firmly believe the safest place for her is at the house.
Bec is sick, very sick, and not a single doctor can figure out what is wrong with her.
And this curse is hanging over our heads, a dark and flimsy promise of hope for my sister. But the cost it will demand, The Tithe that must be paid, is Willow’s life.
I meant what I said to her. I’d give my life to save Rébecca’s. I can’t take Willow’s, though.
I drive in a fog of thoughts and when I get home, the sun is beginning to rise. I head upstairs to my bedroom, where I’m glad to see Willow is still asleep. She hasn’t even moved. The cat is asleep on my pillow, probably leaving a mountain of fur for me to clean up. She opens one eyelid then closes it again. I guess she’s getting used to me.
Quietly, I open the door that connects my room to Willow’s, enter and close it behind me. I switch on the light and scan the place. The first thing I notice is that the frame holding Elizabeth’s portrait is cracked. I wonder if she dropped it, but she’d be too careful for that.
I walk through, looking at the familiar piles, and go into her closet when I don’t find anything other than what I already saw in her room. I open a few drawers to search but don’t come across anything. I do recognize the black tank top her sisters had given her and unfold it to read what’s on the front in rhinestones: Hi, this is my resting witch face.
It’s from her life before me, before The Tithing—although when she was born with the crescent moon on her breast, her family knew her life was already forfeit. Like mine. Like Abacus’s, when we were born with the scars where the wings of the angels who displeased God would have been torn from their bodies. Hell, maybe this whole generation is lost.
I push the drawer halfway closed but it sticks. I bend to look at what is obstructing it, seeing the corner of an envelope sticking out underneath it. I pull the drawer all the way out and turn it over. There I find the same letters she’d quickly hidden from me the other day.
I peel the tape off the drawer, collect the yellowed envelopes, and look at the first one. It’s addressed to Willow Wildblood, her name a deep, angry scrawl. No return address. No stamp. It must have been hand delivered to her house.
All the envelopes have been opened, and I reach into the first of the five and take out the sheet of paper that’s folded in half. The fold is sharp, as if someone went over it again and again and again, and both paper and envelope are expensive. Made to look old, the letter page itself is embossed with a cross I recognize. It’s the same one that is carved into the forehead of every woman The Disciples kill. My jaw clenches, every muscle tightening as I read the few words on the page:
We’re coming for you, witch.
It’s unsigned. Well, unless you count the cross at the bottom right hand corner a signature.
I open the others, all are similar. Cryptic threats by an anonymous stalker.
You can’t hide forever, witch.
You will submit to baptism or you will die, witch.
You will repent for your sins,witch.
Then there’s the final one, the one that has blood rushing through my veins, pounding against my ears—the one that has me crushing the page in my fist.
You belong to me, witch.
25
WILLOW
When I open my eyes to find sunlight streaming through the window, it disorients me. I blink several times, glancing around the bed, noting I’m back in Azrael’s room. I don’t remember walking up here last night.
Did he carry me?
“You’re awake.” His voice startles me.
I lean up on my elbows, meeting his gaze from across the room.
“What are you doing?” I ask him.
He’s just… sitting there like a sentry. It looks like he’s been watching me, and judging by the tension in his jaw, something has shifted since last night.
“I could ask you the same question.” He rises to his full height, stalking over to the bed to dump a stack of familiar letters onto the sheet beside me. “When were you planning to tell me about these?”
I swallow, dread curdling anything sweet we may have had between us last night. Whatever that moment was, it was clearly fleeting, and now it’s been swept away by his anger. It has the immediate effect of putting me on guard as I sit up.
“It’s my business,” I tell him. “Not yours.”
“I’m your goddamned husband,” he growls. “I have a right to know. I can’t protect you if you aren’t honest with me.”
