Chapter 20 #3
“Yes, that’s the tourist level,” my mom explained. “We keep the good stuff upstairs. I think we’ll have everything you’re looking for, and if not, we’ll know where we can get our hands on it.”
Jess grinned. “Excellent.”
We finished eating, and Jess and I helped to clear the table while my mom went to change out of her dirt-smudged overalls, and Rhi put together a plate of food to take out to Persi. She carried it out to the front door, and then called to me.
“Wren? There’s something on the porch here for you!”
Puzzled, I put down the plate I was washing, turned off the water, and walked out to join her at the front door, wiping my hands dry on a dishtowel. “What is it?”
“I don’t know, honey, it’s just got your name on it,” Rhi said, pointing to one of the rocking chairs. Then she continued down the steps and out through the garden to take Persi her food.
I looked down at the seat of the chair. There was a square package wrapped in brown paper, with a note tucked into the string. I picked up the note, which had my name scrawled on the front, and opened it.
I don’t want Bernadette’s last message to go unanswered.
Sorry I threw that vase at you, even though you kind of deserved it.
Also if anything happens to this grimoire I will kill you myself.
Nova
Heart thrumming, I tore open the paper. The grimoire lay inside.
I turned to run into the house to tell my mom, when Rhi’s voice suddenly rang out from behind me, and I swung around again to see her running from the direction of the garden, the plate of food still clutched in her hand.
“She’s not there! Persi’s gone!” she called out.
I opened my mouth to reply, but my mother appeared in the doorway behind me at that moment, making me yelp instead.
“Are you sure? Maybe she’s just refusing to answer,” my mom said.
But Rhi was shaking her head. “I opened the door. It was unlocked. She’s gone.”
All the color drained from my mom’s face. “We’ve got to find her.”
Rhi made an exasperated sound. “I know we do, that’s why I—”
Jess appeared in the doorway, too, having heard everything. “I’ll help you. We can split up. Where might she have gone?”
“Jess, that’s a lovely offer, but you can’t help us, honey, the whole police force is looking for you,” my mom said. “But you and Wren can stay here in case she comes back.”
“I don’t want to stay here!” I said. “I want to help look!”
My mom rounded on me. “Wren, can you please just cooperate? I’ll feel much better if at least one member of our family is home and safe.”
“I’m not a child, Mom, you don’t have to—”
“Look, not to interrupt the teenage rebellion, but… isn’t that Persi coming down the road?” Jess asked.
We all turned to look in the direction she was pointing in time to see a figure walking slowly down the shore road from the north.
It was undoubtedly Persi. Her long tresses of black hair whipped around her face in the wind, just as the long skirts of her black dress whipped around her ankles.
Her feet were bare, her arms crossed tightly over her chest, and her makeup ran in smokey tear tracks down her face.
Rhi dropped the plate she was carrying, and started jogging toward the end of the driveway. We all followed her as she began to call Persi’s name.
“Persi? Persephone! Are you all right? What’s happened honey, where were you?”
Persi didn’t answer. She just continued walking toward us, her face oddly blank.
We spilled out from the end of the gravel drive out into the road, my mom wringing her hands, Rhi still shouting Persi’s name. Jess bobbed anxiously from foot to foot.
“Do you think she’s okay?” Jess asked. “Where do you think she went?”
“I don’t know,” my mom replied, her voice thready with anxiety. “The only things up that way are the Shadow Tree, the Playhouse and—”
“The lighthouse,” I interrupted. “Look.”
At that moment, appearing over the little hill in the road came Diana and Freya, flanking Persi on either side.
A chilly mist was blowing in off the ocean, wrapping the three of them in a swirling haze.
No one moved. We just stood there, transfixed, watching the three of them get closer.
At last Persi stopped walking, still a few yards away from us, and the mist parted enough so that we could see her more clearly.
Her arms weren’t just crossed over her chest. They were clutching something against her body.
She grasped the something with both hands, and held it out so that we could see it.
“It’s the Vesper grimoire,” Rhi murmured, stunned.
“It can’t be,” my mother gasped. “She couldn’t have removed it.”
Persi was walking toward us again, and now she was close enough to answer.
“I couldn’t remove it, no,” she said, “but they could.” And she looked down with a nod of acknowledgment, first to Freya and then to Diana.
Of course. The grimoire had been bound to the cats. I stared in disbelief at Freya, who sat back on her haunches and began to groom herself unconcernedly. I barely managed to clap my hand over my mouth before an incredulous laugh burst from my lips.
Persi walked right up to Rhi, and held out the grimoire to her. Rhi hesitated only a moment before taking it reverently into her own hands.
“We have the Claire grimoire, too,” I said, holding up the package. “Nova came through after all.”
Persi grimly nodded her satisfaction. “Then it’s tonight. We end this tonight.”