16
I remembered bits and pieces of our ride back to the house.
Alex, having never driven a scooter, or any vehicle for that matter, nearly had us killed several times as he sped through stop signs and red lights.
I never fully passed out, but my thoughts drifted in and out as I struggled to remain conscious.
Now, sitting at the kitchen table, the whole crew had surrounded me, including Jordan and Markus, who had heard about a strange incident nearby involving a phantom.
It didn’t take much to piece together who had been the cause of it.
“Sit still.” Ivy was cleaning my wounds. She wanted to summon Alyeesa, the fairy healer she had made a contract with, but I told her not to bother, assuring her it wasn’t a serious injury and I’d heal it myself in the morning.
“You sure you don’t have a concussion?” Stella intervened, pressing a glowing yellow petal to my forehead that absorbed into my skin, stopping the bleeding and medicating the wound. “Looks like you got smacked pretty hard.”
I readjusted the ice pack on the side of my head. “It’s fine. I’m starting to feel better now. Thanks.”
“Gee, I’m back from the dead for one day and you’re already off trying to get yourself sent back to the underworld.
” Jordan shook his head. It was as if his death had never happened.
He might have looked frail, but mentally he was impenetrable.
It was like he pushed all the years of torture behind him, focusing on his new life free from the Syndicate, not the past that should have haunted him.
No cuts or bruises remained, no trace of the hole in his chest that had killed him. With the dirt and grime gone from his face, his pale skin looked unnaturally delicate, stretched tight over sharp cheekbones and a gaunt jaw.
But I was curious why there was still one person missing. “Where’s Ren?” I asked.
Stella huffed. “I tried calling him. He just got back to me about five minutes ago. I’m sure he’ll be here any—”
“Where the fuck is he?” Heavy footsteps stomped down the stairs and into the kitchen, rage burning through Ren as he searched the room, only to ebb away in a shaky breath when he saw me sitting at the table, offering him a wary smile.
“Move.” Ren shoved Stella aside and sat down next to me. His warm fingertips brushed the large gash on the side of my head. “You’re an idiot. When will you stop running around and getting yourself into trouble?”
I smiled shyly. “Well, I am your dandelion weed, after all. I need to live up to my reputation of being annoying and always showing up in places I’m not wanted.”
Ren almost smiled back, but it quickly turned into a frown. “Tell me what happened.”
“I was hanging out with Emily and the others at the cemetery. Car alarms started going off, so I went to investigate. Then I came across the phantom of the Boston Strangler attacking a woman. I wasn’t strong enough to fight him back, but …
” My voice trailed off, and I grabbed the glass of juice beside me, taking a small sip to relieve my parched throat.
Ren knitted his brows. “But what, Theo?”
“I think it was a trap set for me. There was a phantom named Albert, the guy who called himself the Boston Strangler, and he was working with the Syndicate, no, controlled by the Syndicate. He … was trying to dig through my memories to learn what I knew about my connection to Alex, but he found something else instead. A memory of Caspian that wasn’t even mine. ”
Alex pondered the idea as he stared up at the ceiling.
“I guess that makes sense. The magic is a living entity inside you, and even if you don’t remember it yourself, it carries the past with it.
But … why send a phantom to retrieve a memory?
They have other, more reliable methods of extracting data from people. ”
“I … don’t know. They probably knew I’d show up if someone was in trouble. It would be easier to catch me off guard than to kidnap me.”
“Do you remember the details of the memory?” Jordan asked next. “Maybe we can figure out what they’re planning based on what you saw.”
I shook my head. “I only saw part of it, but … Gray was there talking to Caspian. All I remember was this spell array. It had three concentric circles and a bunch of runes that mean nothing to me.”
“Runes?” Markus jumped from his seat, searching for some paper and something to write with. He slapped a notebook and pen in front of me. “If there’s anything I know, it’s runes and magic arrays. Draw for me what you remember. Maybe I can piece it together.”
I started drawing, my shaking hand poorly imitating the fuzzy vision I barely remembered in the first place. “Gray had said something about Caspian risking the entire city for his selfish needs, but I never got a chance to hear what he was actually planning.”
Markus stared intensely at the drawing, rubbing his chin, his eyes magnified through the lenses of his black frames. He grabbed the pen, sketched over my drawing, then turned it back to me. “Did it look something like this?”
My eyes flicked back and forth. “I think so? I can’t be certain. Maybe his grimoire has some answers.”
Markus frowned, worry tightening his expression.
“What is it?” Alex asked. “Does it have something to do with the veil? Or what the Syndicate plans to do with all these captured phantoms?”
“Caspian was obsessed with his own death, right?” Markus handed the notebook to Ren, who stared at it thoughtfully despite the fact it probably made no sense to him.
I nodded. “Without a soul, he’d never be able to pass over into the afterlife to see his family. He was cursed to live forever, watching anyone he ever loved die and leave him. He mentioned more than once that he was tired of living but that his magic wouldn’t let him go.”
“Most magic arrays are single circles, but the more complex they are, the more pieces they can have.” Markus tapped a finger to the outermost circle; a wide, broken shape made of interrupted arcs, not a single continuous line.
“I won’t bore you with the details, but this spell array here is meant to be massive.
The outermost circle dictates how strong the spell will be, the middle one pulls that energy in, and the center circle is the conduit that controls it all. ”
“Control what, exactly?” Ren leaned in, trying to make sense of Markus’ scribbling.
“Hard to tell. The innermost circle is completely empty. Caspian was probably using himself as the anchor in the middle. He was probably searching for his family. If he couldn’t be with them, he’d bring them to him instead.”
“Does anyone know where Gray is?” Ivy interrupted. She was met with a series of shrugs and head shakes. Gray had disappeared once Caspian had vanished and no one had heard from him since. “He’s probably our best chance at figuring out what this means and why the Syndicate is interested in it.”
“We can figure that out tomorrow.” Ren stood from his chair and glowered at me. “You. You are a mess. Go sleep. Markus can reach out to Nick to see if he knows anything. I’ll go through Caspian’s grimoire.”
“Of course, Mom,” I teased. I said my goodbyes to Jordan and Markus and headed upstairs to my room. Ren wasn’t far behind. “Are you following me so that you can tuck me in and read me a bedtime story?”
“You’re not five,” Ren quipped as he shut the bedroom door behind him.
I sat down on the bed, removing my shoes. Ren bashfully looked away as I changed into my pajamas and I crawled under the sheets.
The mattress dipped when he sat beside me, reaching over to touch the matted hair on the side of my head where Albert had smashed me into the wall.
Ivy had meticulously cleaned it up, but I didn’t have enough energy left in me to take a shower to rinse off the rest of my body.
My head was still throbbing, and I knew that while I’d have a massive headache come tomorrow morning, my magic would ensure there were no lasting effects from what happened.
“Does it hurt?” Ren spoke softly.
“Of course it hurts, Ren. My head was slammed against a brick wall. Stella was right. I probably do have a concussion. Are you sure I should even be sleeping right now? Maybe you should stay the night with me.”
“You’ll be fine.” Ren saw right through my scheme. I sighed as warm magic seeped into my skin, absorbing into the wound. I recognized this power instantly.
“You’re pretty good with my magic,” I mumbled. He wasn’t as adept at using it as I was, but in two months, he had reached a level that had taken me years. My skin tightened in response, drawn taut in a way that felt like caterpillars wiggling under my skin. But in the end, it worked.
“I learned a lot while I was in the underworld.” He pulled away. “Actually … I met someone while I was there.”
“Oh?” Jealousy flashed across my face before I could hide it.
“Not like that, Theo.” Ren rolled his eyes. “I met a ghost who had studied disruptive magic in his past life. I showed him what you had taught me, how I could trade or borrow magic instead of stealing it, and he showed me how to refine it.”
“Oh. Well, I’m really happy to hear that. And I’m glad you weren’t alone the whole time. Tell me more about this mysterious ghost friend of yours. He sounds like a nice guy.”
“Yeah. He was. Maybe another time. Get some rest, Theo.” Ren got up and moved toward the closet door, the portal that led him back to his other home in Boston. “I’ll start digging through Caspian’s grimoire tonight to see if that array is in there. I’ll be back tomorrow.”
“Hey, Ren …” I said softly, my voice catching in my throat. Warmth tightened in my chest as I looked at him.
He turned around with his hand on the doorknob.
“This doesn’t change anything. We’re still on for tomorrow night. We’ve got a date, and no serial killer phantom is going to stop me from taking you out for a nice mediocre dinner.”
“Wouldn’t miss it for the world. Night, Theo.” I caught a faint flicker of a smile as he turned around and left.