Chapter Fifty
FIFTY
LEAD FILLS MY STOMACH, CEMENTING my body to the bed.
Because in exchange for twelve lives, no Lee Valley Witch will wield her power until the final Cardinal ascends, bringing forth the prophecy and ushering in the Great War.
Twelve lives for peace, no matter how temporary.
Twelve lives to bring forth the power of the Cardinals.
Twelve lines of ancestral magic to shroud the Celestial Cusp, to hide the lines from sinister creatures, ill-intentioned monsters, and shadow ilk hell-bent on destroying all that stands in their way.
That is, until the last Cardinal meets their catalyst.
When she comes, they will feel it…
Nora’s words are knife tips cutting into me repeatedly.
These witches exchanged their lives for this… this prophecy.
These witches sacrificed their magic and the magic of four generations of our coven to hide the Celestial Cusp from the hunters. To stave off the destruction of the world long enough to bring the prophecy to fruition, to birth the Cardinal Witches. These witches gave up everything for me.
Am I truly the savior of my people?
Or just another sacrifice?
I have the distinct feeling that even now I’m only forming the most basic understanding of what I am, of the dangers that await me.
And more than that, I can’t shake the feeling that the death of those twelve women rests on my shoulders. Though now more than ever, I don’t understand them. It’s clear that they’re the ones who appeared alongside Nora in the hedge maze.
If I am their Cardinal, if I am the Water, why would they suppress my magic? Why would they put me at risk like that?
Still… guilt begins to take up space where my heart should be.
Guilt and sorrow.
And anger. No. Fury.
If the stars rule all, if they are our guiding light, how could they have let this happen? If they knew this would be my fate, why take Gigi from me right when I needed her most? Why abandon me here like this, woefully unprepared?
I suppose it doesn’t matter.
If I am the last Cardinal, then I must ascend before “a century’s time.”
The last entry is dated November 3. This means I have two days to prepare to meet my catalyst or risk losing our coven’s magic forever, leaving the Celestial Cusp vulnerable to those that wish to drain it.
Two days to save the world from certain destruction.
The thought of it is too intense. It’s too much pressure.
My legs carry me out of the room and down the stairs, my muscles vibrating as I burst through the back door. This uncontrollable wrath is now a swirling storm that whips across the yard, debris flying from the trees.
I am a black hole, consuming the universe.
The shock of cold rain against my skin evaporates into steam as I march, my hair lashing violently against my face, my hoodie billowing in vicious waves across my torso. I fight against it, my mind set on one thing only.
Gigi’s tree stands, its thin sapling trunk bending with the harsh gusts. Its branches have grown since the memorial, and now they whistle as they slash through the air. I think for a moment that the tree will be uprooted. I can’t find the mercy to care.
When my feet reach the edge of the garden bed, surrounded by the stones we placed at the funeral, I collapse.
“Why did you do this?” I scream over the wailing storm. Violent, cruel sobs rip from my chest until my breath rattles like pneumonia in my lungs.
I am no prophecy. No Cardinal.
I want to die right here, melt into the ground and join the only woman who could have protected me from this.
But I remember the merciless dark of the hedge maze.
There was no protection for me then, and there isn’t any now.
I was never worth the sacrifice.
“Didn’t you love me? Didn’t you care if I would be okay?” I roar at her ash-turned body buried beneath the roots of the tree.
My thoughts are not rational, and my words come out broken, slivered by my wheezing breaths. “You can’t abandon me like this! How am I supposed to do this without you? I never wanted this!” My throat is raw and burning.
“You left me! You left me here to suffer! You left me to deal with this all alone!” I don’t stop the words before they come tumbling out of me. “I hate you!”
Drooping forward, I press my forehead against the wet ground.
It doesn’t matter if she thought we had more time. It doesn’t matter if her death was some cruel twist of fate, some unfortunate coincidence destined to damn me. There’s no grace left in the shattered remains of my heart.
I shake uncontrollably against the storm that rages within and outside of me, flooding me until I’m choking and dizzy and gasping for breath. When I have nothing left to give, the rain slows, and my eyes close against my will, complete and total exhaustion overcoming me.
Minutes or hours later, the sound of birds singing rouses me from my sleep. I am filled with an everlasting cold. Like a switch has flipped. Like a peg has slotted into place.
When I raise my hands to shield my eyes from the rising sun, I find that I am bereft of feeling. For once my mind is quiet. My eyes drift to the nearby sycamore. Four red birds tilt their heads in unison.
Four generations.
Four Cardinals.
Gone is the insecurity of yesterday, the flood of emotion that threatened to end me. In its place stands something real. Something solid for me to hold on to. In the darkness of my sleep one thing rang true, a single shred of light puncturing the oblivion of my mind.
Tomorrow is the Centennial Night of Remembrance.
One hundred years since the new Twelve buried our magic beneath the soil of what is now Lee Chapel.
I will not let their deaths go to waste.
My lips pull back against my teeth.
I will protect the Celestial Cusp and the lines of power running beneath Black Mountain.
I will save us from the rot slowly taking over the land.
I will right the imbalance. Just as the Daughter foresaw.
I don’t care what he said, or that he told me to run, or that there’s countless summers and an ocean of unresolved feelings between us. Malachi Matsoukas has been created to kill me.
But he isn’t going to kill me.
Because I’m going to kill him first.