Steadfast

14

AFTER THEY LEFT VERLAINE AT THE HOSPITAL, MATEO had a crash course on the apocalypse.

He went home with Nadia, luckily arriving there while her father and brother were out, so they could skip the fake small talk and head straight to her attic. Nadia quickly found the symbol in Goodwife Hale’s Book of Shadows and showed him the notes in her own that talked about the three barriers that stood between the world he knew and, as he put it, “total Ghostbusters-style, dogs-and-cats-living-together, mass-hysteria Armageddon.”

“Pretty much.” Nadia had yanked her hair back in a ponytail, her eyes blazing with an energy that was part anger, part adrenaline. “It never occurred to me that Elizabeth would try this. I never thought it was something even a Sorceress would want. They draw their power from the demonic realm. Destroying the barriers means even destroying herself. She’s willing to die if it means she takes the whole world with her.”

Mateo nodded. He knew now what he had to do, no matter how much it horrified him, no matter how hard it would be. “If she’s willing to die, well, that makes it easier.”

Nadia was fishing around in the jar of Hershey’s Miniatures that sat in a row with her witchcraft supplies. “Makes what easier?”

“Going after her.” Though he tried to say the words like it was a foregone conclusion, he knew he didn’t quite manage it: “Killing her.”

For a moment Nadia didn’t answer him. She didn’t even move, just sat there on her knees staring at his face like she’d never seen him before. Then she said, “Elizabeth might die as a result of her own magic, I guess. I’m not worrying about that.”

“That’s not what I mean.” Mateo couldn’t quite believe he was saying this, and yet he knew beyond any doubt this was the only way to win. “You want to stop her from working any dark magic, right? Well, there’s one way to make sure she stops. And I think we ought to consider it.”

“Listen—you’re upset, you’re freaked out for Verlaine, I get that—”

“I don’t think you get it at all. Come on. You thought you killed her on Halloween! Why are you getting squeamish about it now?”

“I didn’t murder her on Halloween,” Nadia said. “She was the one who created the fire and stood in the middle of it. I just didn’t risk my life to rescue her. Big difference.”

Obviously Nadia wasn’t thinking this through. “The point is, we’re not exactly worried about keeping her alive. In fact, the longer Elizabeth lives, the more people she hurts, and the closer the One Beneath gets to eating our world alive. So why wouldn’t we kill her?”

“What makes you think we could? Just her Book of Shadows nearly killed me when I went into her house to look for you. The protective spells she knows, the enchantments around every single place she travels—it’s like she’s at the center of a fortress, Mateo. We’re not getting through that fortress without some high-level magic on our side.”

“And that’s exactly what she expects you to do! Outspell her, whatever you’d call it. She wouldn’t expect us to just . . . take her out.”

“You sound like you’re talking about a video game,” Nadia snapped. “Seriously, Mateo, what are you talking about? Stabbing her? Strangling her? Are you the kind of person who could do that to another human being?”

That caught him off guard. Once, in the final horrible hours before Halloween, the magical snares Elizabeth had used to bind Mateo to her had weakened. He’d rushed at her; he’d meant to strangle her. He’d tried to. And in the end he hadn’t been able to follow through.

The result was that Elizabeth had opened this door for the One Beneath, and Nadia had very nearly been killed.

Instead of answering, Mateo said, “I’ve seen Elizabeth as she really is. You haven’t. She’s hardly even a human being any longer. I don’t think she counts. So maybe—maybe it doesn’t matter what we do to her.”

Nadia shook her head and took Mateo’s hands in hers. A lock of her shining, black hair fell across her cheek, only emphasizing the beauty of her heart-shaped face. His anger gentled as she said, “I’m not as worried about what it would do to her. I worry about what killing her would do to you.”

How did she do that? Look into his eyes, say a few words, and somehow say the thing that stopped him cold, spoke to his soul? Mateo didn’t know, but Nadia always seemed to find a way.

He squeezed her fingers more tightly, and when she smiled at him, unsure but hopeful, he decided they could try to think of something else. What that “something else” could possibly be, he didn’t know, and he was pretty sure they’d have to come back to this conversation sooner rather than later. But maybe Nadia needed more time; maybe he did, too. For now, it was okay to just hear her out. “What other options are there?”

“Well. There’s one possibility.” She paused, as though she didn’t want to say the rest. “I could tell Elizabeth I’m going to join her.”

He jerked back. It was like she’d slapped him. “You didn’t—you wouldn’t, ever.”

“Not for real. I mean, of course not. But if I just told her that I’d learn from her, work with her, I’d be able to find out what Elizabeth’s really up to.”

“We know that now. She’s trying to bring the One Beneath to our world, which is apparently a thousand different kinds of bad.”

Mateo’s voice had risen more than he meant it to, but before he could feel bad about it, Nadia started yelling, too. “I can’t stop her from bringing the One Beneath here if I don’t learn more about how she’s doing this.” She tossed her own Book of Shadows a couple of feet away, like it was useless instead of this priceless, secret thing. “Mom might have been a coldhearted bitch capable of leaving her whole family, but she wouldn’t have done anything like this, ever. She wasn’t able to teach me about magic this dark.” Finally, almost as a whisper, Nadia said, “Mom wasn’t this bad. No matter what, she wasn’t this bad.”

It wasn’t as though Mateo couldn’t hear how badly Nadia was hurting. Or that he thought she wasn’t as scared as he was for Verlaine’s dad. Instead it was like those words—work with her—were pounding a drumbeat that drowned out everything else.

Elizabeth had taken his mother. His grandfather. His chance at being accepted, ever, in this stupid, small town. She had blood on her hands and a demon on her side, and Nadia was willing to work with her?

Elizabeth was going to take Nadia, too.

“You say that now,” Mateo said. “You think you can learn some high-level magic, make yourself stronger, and get out. But there’s no way it’s that easy, Nadia. You think Elizabeth started out this dark? I bet she didn’t. I bet she believed it would just be a couple of spells, a little more knowledge, and then she’d be out. Next thing you know, she’s not even human. And this time it’s going to be you.”

Nadia gaped at him. “You actually think I’d go dark? That I’d serve the One Beneath? How could you ever, ever say something like that?”

It had been meant as a warning, not an accusation, but at the moment, Mateo didn’t care. His mind was filled with one horrible image: Nadia as the beastlike, inhuman thing he’d once seen as Elizabeth—golden, melting, ferocious, and brutal. If she changed, his Steadfast powers would force him to see exactly how quickly her humanity drained away. “I don’t know. You want more power, don’t you? You’re always talking about it. How little you know, how much you wish your mom had taught you. You went diving in the sound to get this other spell book even though it nearly killed you.” And then he said the thing he knew he shouldn’t say but couldn’t hold back. “You definitely want your magic more than you want me.”

“What?” Her eyes went wide, like she had no idea what he was talking about. And she knew. She had to know. “Mateo, you’re not making any sense.”

“Yeah, I am. I love you more than you love me, and we both know it.”

“Mateo, please.” Nadia kept shaking her head no, which was meaningless, because everything he’d said was true. “Please, don’t.”

“I have to get out of here.” He grabbed his backpack and headed for the door. Just as he pushed down the ladder, though, he hesitated. “I’ll bring the knife by tomorrow. If you can use it to help Verlaine’s dad, you should.”

When Nadia nodded, he could see that he’d made her cry. Which made him feel like dirt—but he hadn’t said anything that wasn’t true. It didn’t matter. He felt awful anyway.

Her voice shook as she said, “Did you just break up with me?”

Dammit, now his own throat was tight. “No. Because I love you and I can’t help it. But I can’t be here right now.”

The attic door fell shut behind him, like he’d slammed it. He hadn’t. Just sounded that way.

From the higher branches of the tree next to the Caldani home, two witnesses watched Mateo get onto his motorcycle and roar away. One was the crow, which looked on with cobweb eyes, projecting every moment back to Elizabeth.

The other was Asa, who lounged along one long, crooked limb, the wood smoldering slightly beneath him.

“Damn, I’m good,” he said to the crow.

The bird responded by flapping its broad wings and flying away. Asa sighed.

He couldn’t see into the attic from this vantage point, and his myriad powers didn’t involve X-ray vision. But Asa was close enough to hear Nadia’s sobs. They told him all he needed to know.

They’re further apart now. That makes each of them more likely to follow my suggestions. If even one of them succeeds, I rid myself of Elizabeth. And if they’re parted, the One Beneath is more likely to win in the end. Instead of owing His triumph to Elizabeth, He’ll owe it to me.

Maybe then I could be free.

He was lost in thought—rare for him, with his laser-like focus—but this dream was too precious to resist. If Asa were free, he wouldn’t have to suffer in hell any longer. He wouldn’t have to do the bidding of the One Beneath any longer . . .

. . . but he wouldn’t be able to live in the human world, either. At least, not the human world as he now knew it. After the One Beneath’s triumph, there would be little difference between this place and hell. Good-bye, internet; good-bye, blue skies; good-bye, Burger King chicken sandwiches; good-bye, loving parents; good-bye, Celtics games; good-bye, joy and laughter and Verlaine’s smile—

The scent of woodsmoke around him grew stronger. Asa realized he’d lost his concentration enough to very nearly set the tree ablaze, and he wasn’t here to start fires.

So he rolled off the limb, caught himself with one hand for a moment, then dropped silently to the ground, landing on his feet. The jolt would have broken bones in a human; for Asa, it registered as a thump, no more.

Night had begun to fall. In his black coat and dark jeans, he blended easily into the shadows, no magic required. He liked walking along the streets without being seen, without having to pretend to be Jeremy Prasad. Not that there weren’t parts of that masquerade he relished—but sometimes he wanted the simple luxury of being himself, being able to enjoy this world for what it was.

Two weeks to Thanksgiving, a holiday Asa had never experienced. It seemed to involve eating, so he was game to give it a try. He ought to have the joys of this world while they were still here for the having. The more brilliant colors of the leaves had faded to brown, and already as many were on the ground as on the trees. Given the heat that radiated from him, he didn’t need a coat; the one he wore was mostly for show, and also because he looked damn good in it. The mere humans around him were already beginning to don heavier coats, scarves, and those ridiculous knitted hats that made them look like garden gnomes.

Thinking of garden gnomes reminded him of the last time he’d become seriously distracted, enough to nearly start a fire—the night he’d watched Verlaine working on her computer. Her silver hair had fallen over her shoulders, and the light from her screen had illuminated the thin, fragile lines of her face. Her eyes had been wide, like she was drinking in every single thing she could learn, everything the world had to offer.

That memory was replaced by the one from this afternoon in the hospital, when she’d slumped in a plastic chair like a broken doll, all hope and joy gone.

Two people, he thought, anger rising inside him. Only two humans in the world aren’t ensnared by Elizabeth’s spell. Only two of them can see Verlaine for what she really is: her fathers. She might have been allowed to keep them both. It was so little, and it was all she had.

He thought of going back to her, but no. Verlaine would be with her remaining father now; they needed each other. There was little else for Asa to do but go home.

The mood was a little strained around the Prasad home at present. Mom had been allowed to come home two days earlier, having shown no further signs of dangerous behavior. (When not influenced by magic spells, Mrs. Prasad could come no closer to violence than cooking her superspicy curry.) Still, she remained shaken, and Dad kept agreeing to absolutely anything she said so as to avoid setting off another “incident.” This of course irritated her more than any argument could, so both of them remained tense and cranky.

However, Asa did his best, telling funny stories about school that made them smile, and asking his mother what she wanted for her birthday next week. Her face lit up so brightly that he knew, beyond any doubt, that Jeremy Prasad had never remembered his mother’s birthday in his life.

So. Errands for evil Sorceress: taken care of. Verlaine: in the best place she could be. Prasad parents: pacified.

And yet he still had to do forty-five minutes’ worth of medieval history homework before bed.

I’ve known people from the fourteenth century, he mused as he started outlining his paper about the Hundred Years’ War. You’d think it would speed things up a little. But no. And I’m being forced to assist in an apocalypse I’d rather never see; could it at least happen before this paper is due? Of course not.

Around nine p.m., his father appeared in the doorway of his room. “Hard at work, I see.”

“History.”

“Your mother seems well. Doesn’t she?”

“Yeah.” Then, thinking better of his casual reply, Asa tried to assume a more stricken expression, one that would make it clear he was anguished but finding the strength to carry on . . . something like that. Of course he knew his mother was fine, that she’d just run into an amateurishly executed couple of spells. But nobody else knew it yet, so a little more concern was called for.

“I just wanted to say, you’ve really come through these past couple of weeks. For your mother and for me.” Mr. Prasad looked surprisingly moved. “You’ve made some changes recently. Keeping your room clean, not talking back, doing your homework. Don’t think we haven’t noticed. It meant a lot to your mom, you being there for her.”

“We’re family. That’s what family does.” At least, as far as Asa remembered.

Mr. Prasad smiled, slightly disbelieving. “You’re finally starting to grow up, son.” Then he shuffled off to bed.

Asa glanced at the screen saver on his computer, which was a collection of pictures Jeremy had taken over the past several months. Girls in bikinis either pretending they would flash him or actually doing it; him and his friends hanging on one another while drunk; one of a guy vomiting on the beach while Jeremy laughed: The sheer monotony of it was clear to Asa, even if it hadn’t been to Jeremy. This was all just sensation—the most primitive kind—apparently selfish and certainly thoughtless.

Jeremy’s face came up again, this time as he stood behind the wheel of a speedboat. He didn’t seem to be watching where he was going—on the water at a speed that, to judge by the flumes of sea spray behind him, could be no less than sixty-five miles an hour. Really, it was a miracle Elizabeth had even gotten the chance to kill him; by rights, Jeremy ought to have died of pure idiocy long ago.

Asa murmured, “I’m a better you than you ever were.”