Chapter 38
Atornado seems to erupt around Mallory as Penelope and several others rush through the cottage in a blur. They dump a line of salt at the doorway. Form a circle with an array of crystals. Drop a cluster of burning herbs into a small canister in the hall.
Ezra is alive. He’s alive, he’s—
He pounds at the door again. There’s urgency in the sound, desperation mounting with every crack of his fist. “Open the door!” Ezra yells. “I know you’re here.”
“Do not,” one of the women orders.
But Mallory barely hears the warning, inching closer to the window.
She needs to see for herself.
Mallory peers through the willowy curtains, breath catching at the sight of him on the porch. His profile is illuminated by the flickering lamp, casting a glow on his tortured expression.
“Jules, open the door—please!”
She watches as his determination slips into despair, witnessing the exact moment he realizes she might not answer.
“Please.” Ezra’s forehead tips against the wood. “Jules, there’s not much time.”
Midnight swirls around his shoulders. Sadness pulls at his face. For once, he doesn’t look like a man who battles death, a man capable of murder.
He just looks like a man she could have loved.
“He’s telling the truth,” Mallory says.
“You don’t know that,” Penelope cautions. “Do you know what happens if you invite a demon into your home?”
“He’s not a demon.”
Or maybe he is. Maybe he’s both, all of it, at the same time. Maybe everyone is just everything they’ve ever been—good and bad, fused as one, impossible to separate. “We don’t have to invite him in. I’ll go outside.”
Mallory pushes past the women in white, ignoring their pleas. Snatching her coat, she opens the door and steps onto the porch.
Ezra looks up, eyes flashing as though he didn’t expect to see her ever again. For a moment, there’s only the quiet breeze, the distant cry of an owl.
“You’re alive.” The words are obvious and foolish, but she blurts them anyway.
He nods. “I think…I think he saved me.”
Mallory swallows a note of fear. “How did you find us here?” She falters, realizing. “Did you know about this house from the start?”
“Our congregation tracked it down a while ago,” Ezra admits, every word echoing with remorse.
“Back when we first learned the transfer spell had been done. When you weren’t at your dorm tonight, I had a feeling you’d be here.
It was easier to get to than expected. My dad has a boat at the yacht club in Bristol. ” Ezra’s eyes shift. “Had a boat.”
She shivers at the memory of his father’s lifeless body in the chapel basement. “Why did you come?”
Ezra takes a step toward her. She doesn’t back up. She stands her ground this time, inches from him.
“I’ll do it,” he says, and Mallory frowns in confusion. “I’ll take the curse from Saskia. Tell the witches they can send it to me. The self-offering compulsion. I’ll take it from you both.”
“What?” Mallory’s breath rushes out. “That doesn’t make sense.”
“It does,” Ezra counters. “The curse can only be transferred, right? As long as the recipient is willing?”
“Right, but—”
“I’m willing.” Ezra’s throat tightens as he swallows. Moonlight illuminates the sincerity in his eyes. “I’m willing.”
She falls quiet, and he tries again, his tone solemn.
“I was wrong before,” Ezra says. “What I suggested, about continuing my bloodline. Creating an heir. I never should’ve said that. That was—that was fucked-up of me. This is the real way out. Let me get this right.”
Mallory shakes her head. “Do you realize what you’re even agreeing to?”
“I do.” A muscle feathers in his jaw, a sight that’s achingly familiar to her at this point. “The other night, you asked if what we had was real. You have no idea how much it hurt to hear you say that. For me, the answer is more than you can ever imagine.”
Tears sting her eyes; the back of her throat burns.
“I would do anything for you,” Ezra confesses. “I’d torch that whole campus, this entire fucking world, burn it all to the ground to build something new with you in its place.” He swallows again. “But it’s too late for any of that now.”
“Ezra, I—”
“All those nights we spent looking for your ghost?” His gaze sears into hers, stern and somber. “We wouldn’t have had to look far for mine. Because it’s always been you. You’re my ghost, Jules.”
Her lashes are heavy with tears; Ezra becomes a blur in front of her.
Through a film of stars, she sees him in all his iterations—the mysterious stranger swindling secrets, the monster with fangs in her throat.
But tonight, he’s none of those things. He’s just Ezra, emotions stripped raw, the parts of him he rarely let her see in full view.
“I’ll be haunted no matter what,” Ezra adds, and his eyes are wet, too. “Let me do this for you. Please.”
“You’ll die,” Penelope says from behind them.
Mallory and Ezra both whirl to find her in the doorway.
“I know,” Ezra responds, and the quiet that follows is heavy, resolute.
“The self-offering compulsion in Saskia is incredibly strong right now,” Penelope says softly.
“But, Ezra, your physical body is exceptionally weak because of the demon that’s been inhabiting you.
I can’t say for certain what will happen.
You may succumb to the compulsion of the curse and attempt to remove your own heart, or the impact of the simultaneous supernatural energy might destroy your body before you can.
” She swallows. “Either way, death will be swift. It will also be excruciating.”
Mallory studies his expression, his unwavering resolve. Ezra has made his decision, she realizes. He’s choosing this ending, facing down tragedy with clear eyes.
There will be no talking him out of it.
“I understand,” Ezra says. “If I continue down the path I’ve been headed, I’m only going to leave behind more pain.
Generations of it.” He slides Mallory a pointed look before turning to Penelope.
“I’ve done my research. Infecting myself with the Blood Angel’s curse will kill me, as you said.
But the angel is tied to my bloodline. Turning this curse on myself—his own curse—will end him, too.
Send him back to that dark place beneath the world, where he belongs.
” Ezra reaches into his coat, procuring an old, weathered book with a raven stamped on the cover.
“Which is why, after I’m gone, you’ll need to burn this. ”
Mallory’s eyes widen at the book she’s seen in her visions. The Book of Angels.
“The book must be destroyed,” Ezra continues, “so no one is able to conjure the creature again. Within these pages, the incantation that woke the demon is marked with the blood of the original offering. Lily’s blood.
Destroying the book—it will also destroy him.
” He inhales, determined. “It’s time to take accountability for the horrible things my father and grandfather have done.
For the things I’ve done. It’s going to end with me. Here. Tonight.”
Another long silence passes between them.
“I want to do it,” Ezra repeats. “I give my permission.”
“Ezra,” Mallory interjects. “Are you sure—?”
A sudden, keening scream interrupts her. In the next instant, the blonde woman in white appears on the porch with blood smeared across her face, patches of it along her neck.
“She’s in trouble,” the woman exclaims, breathless. She grips a crystal, pressing it once to her lips. “She’s trying to claw out her heart with her own hands!”
Pulse spiking, Mallory bolts inside. She’s vaguely aware of Ezra’s attempt to follow, the way Penelope tells him to wait on the porch. Mallory sprints down a darkened corridor toward the raised voices, and barrels into the orchid room—where she cries out before she can stop herself.
Saskia kneels in the middle of a canopy bed, wrists adorned with dangling ribbons, as though she’d been tied up but ripped herself free. Several other girls are trying to hold her down, and Mallory’s gaze flies to her fingers.
They’re covered in blood.
Mallory runs to her, frantically calculating how much damage she’s caused with her nails. But there’s so much blood—on her chest, her dress, the bedsheets—it’s hard to tell.
“We have to move quickly,” Penelope says from the doorway. She turns to the dark-haired woman in white, instructing her to start a fire. To Mallory she adds, “Bring Ezra around back.”
Mallory nods. Turning to Saskia’s writhing body, she presses her forehead to hers. Her skin is ice-cold.
Say it, she urges herself. Say it now. Her mind spins and spins with the cacophony of unsaid words, of lost time. Of how much it will hurt if she never says it at all.
“I love you, Saskia,” she confesses, her voice barely a whisper. “I love you, I love you—”
A ridiculous part of her expects Saskia to soften. To say it back, as though Mallory’s words can break the curse, like some kind of fairy tale. But instead, Saskia only howls.
Mallory has become invisible to her.
“Come now,” the blonde woman says.
Mallory wrenches herself away from Saskia and back into the hall, where Penelope stops her with a hand on her arm.
“You need to know two things,” she says. “First, this might not work. Saskia’s body is very, very weak. There’s a strong chance Ezra and Saskia both die here tonight.”
Mallory shoves the dread away, buries it down.
“The second is more important,” Penelope says as they walk down the corridor. “When Saskia underwent this ritual with you, her life was altered. By going through it a second time, her path will be reset. Meaning whatever was originally fated to befall her may ultimately find her again.”
Mallory skews her mouth to the side.
“Saskia was sick. Are you saying…she’ll get sick again?”
“I can’t say for sure,” Penelope replies. “But, Mallory, no one can outrun what’s meant for them. Destiny finds you. One way or another. Do you understand what I’m saying?”
A heavy stone of exhaustion weighs down Mallory’s chest. She’s vaguely aware of the implication behind Penelope’s words, but all she can taste is desperation.
For one more chance.
To not let this be a collection of lasts.