Silver (22 page)

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It's not until my mom hugs me and tells me Happy Birthday that I realize how long I've been waiting for someone to say those words. It's been nineteen hours and twenty-seven minutes.

Mom sits down at the kitchen table and holds up an ad mock-up for
R.D. Magazine
. “Do you like this one?” She waves the glossy picture of herself, complete with perfect smile and anchorwoman helmet hair.

“It's nice.”

“I thought you were going out with Haley and Christy?” she asks. It's kind of a tradition for the three of us to go to dinner together—no parents—on our birthdays. Tonight we were supposed to go to Olive Garden, eating too many breadsticks and not enough salad.

“Change of plans.”

Mom goes through another stack of photos. “I'm not sure whether to feature the new listing or the big ranch house from last month.” She holds up two more photographs.

“Definitely the ranch.” I plop myself down on the leather couch in the family room next to the kitchen. “It's flashier.”

Mom scrunches her face at the pictures. “So you'll be home tonight for your birthday? Your dad and I were planning to take you out tomorrow. You could invite a friend.”

I don't bother to say that the list of potential invitees, never huge to begin with, has dwindled to zero. I shrug.

“Oh, honey.” Mom gets up from the table and sits down next to me. “You're not still worried about Nana's superstitions? It might be kind of cool, having powers.”

Mom did
not
just bring up something as uncomfortable as my effed-up legacy. “Trust me. It's not cool. It's the supernatural equivalent of someone putting an Uzi submachine gun in your hands and telling you to shoot,” I say.

Her lips pucker. “Has something happened?”

I'm not sure what to say, so I don't say anything. “I think I might have a buyer for Dart.”

I know Mom won't be able to resist the chance to change the subject to a more comfortable topic, and she doesn't disappoint. “Is that what this is about? Well, you knew you were going to have to sell him eventually. Will you get a good price?”

I nod.

“That's great! It's what you've been working so hard for.”

I get up from the couch.

“Should I make the dinner reservations?”

“Sure.” Might as well take a page from Mom and try to act like nothing's happening. The act might be the only normal thing I have left.

Mom smiles again, satisfied that she's fulfilled her duties as a parent while successfully avoiding the messy stuff. “Will Haley join us?”

“I'm thinking of having it be just us this year.”

Mom doesn't hide her surprise. “Really? That sounds great.” I can't get a read on whether she's truly happy or not. Now that we're talking again, she might be nervous about trying to sustain a conversation for a couple of hours without a friend as a buffer. She stands up and walks back to the table, already rifling through her photos.

For some reason, I can't not talk about it anymore. “Mom.”

She stops, frozen.

“Can you sit back down?”

She walks back slowly, as if afraid that if she moves too fast she'll spook me and I'll bolt. But I don't. I wait for her sit down on the couch.

And then I tell her everything. About the night on the beach with Blake. About Austin and his plan to use me to kill all the Sons. I tell her about Jonah, how he attacked me and attacked Dart. I tell her about Sherri Milliken, about how I blew up Jonah's truck. How Sasha was killed. How Blake doesn't trust me now.

To her credit, my mom doesn't flinch. She doesn't ask a lot of questions. She doesn't even attempt to lecture me about safe sex or responsible magic. She waits until I'm done before she asks, “Is that all?” with a soft smile playing at the corners of her lips.

I nod, then add, “And I'm kind of in a fight with Haley.”

She laughs, a kind laugh, and I find myself laughing with her. Finally, when we stop, she sits up straight. “Well, it does sound like a lot at once, but if anyone is smart enough to figure out how to make things right, it's you.”

“You're supposed to say that. You're my mom.” But the truth is, I've missed hearing it. She used to always tell me how smart I was and how I could do anything I wanted to, until the fire and then Nana getting sick. Then she just stopped talking to me about anything that mattered.

“It's the truth. What research have you done so far?”

“Research?”

“It's the first thing to do, right? No need to reinvent the wheel. All the big breakthroughs are just extensions of the thousands that came before.”

The scientific method. Mom was the first person to propose the idea that a chemical reaction in the lab must have been what started the fire. She gave me the gift of logic when I couldn't deal with the reality of what was happening to me. She's handing me the same lifeline now, but this time it's not just an avoidance method.

“The problem is, when it comes to this stuff, I
am
reinventing the wheel. I don't know anything about our past—not the secret one, anyway.”

A crease appears on my mother's forehead. “That's not entirely true.”

“What do I have? A bunch of rumors about what I might become and a bracelet that I wasn't allowed to take off.”

Mom shakes her head. “Maybe our history wasn't spelled out for you, but it was always there. Nana never let you forget the old ways.”

Nana told me about witches and faeries and black cats. I fail to see how any of that could prepare me for
this
. But Mom's eyes are teary and I don't have the heart to fight her, so I just nod.

“What?” Mom must see the doubt in my eyes.

“I just don't see what witchcraft and superstitions have to do with anything. I'm not a witch.”

Mom smiles. “Nana never said you were. She said if you practiced magic you'd be burned as one. ‘Witch' is just a word used by your enemies to demonize your power.”

“But I don't think it works that way. There aren't any spells or anything like that. I can just
do
things.”

“Have you ever tried to do a spell? Nana was so adamant that you not try.”

I have tried. Twice, with Christy's book. But both times nothing happened. Well, not nothing, exactly. I did pass out and have those weird dreams about Danu.

“What did Nana tell you about me, exactly?” I ask.

Mom blinks. She doesn't say anything at first, and for a minute I think I've lost her.

“She said you would conjure blue fire and control the sky and earth. I thought she was speaking metaphorically.” Her voice cracks as she speaks. “Then there was the fire at the school.”

“You told me it was the chemicals in the lab.” I guess Mom and I aren't so different after all. On some level we both wanted to pretend this wasn't happening.

“I just wanted you to have a normal life.”

“But I'm not normal. Nana knew exactly what I was. She knew I made the fire.”

“She was terrified. She believed in the curse so much that she swore she wouldn't have any children. Then she ended up pregnant with me. She decided to risk having me since I would only be the sixth generation, but she moved to San Francisco shortly after I was born. She thought if she could keep me far from Ireland, then my children might be safe. Even so, she tried to talk me out of marrying your father. She tried to talk me out of having you.”

“She thought I would become a killer.”

Mom looks away, but not before I see the tears in her eyes. “I didn't believe her. I still don't. But she was convinced. And there was the fire. The blue flame. Those two children were inside the building with you.”

“I didn't kill them. Why didn't you tell me everything then? There was no reason to keep secrets at that point. I needed to know.”

“Nana was worried about you. She said you shouldn't have been able to conjure fire at that age. She thought it was better if you didn't believe that you'd caused it. It was better if you didn't try to use it again.”

Oh God. Nana wasn't protecting me as much as she was protecting everyone else. Nana knew about the monster in me. She just wanted to keep it tucked safely under the bed.

Mom rubs her lips together. “Nothing else happened after that. Even I was convinced the fire was an accident.”

“But not Nana.”

Mom sighs. “She always believed in magic. She said the men who burned witches would come for you eventually, and we shouldn't interfere.”

Shouldn't interfere? “You mean, you should let them kill me?”

“No.” She looks back at me, more certain. “No. She said that you would be strong enough to fight them on your own.”

“What if I don't want to?”

Mom's eyes widen with worry, and I realize she's taken my statement the wrong way. “I don't have a death wish or anything,” I assure her. “I don't want any of this. I just want to be something close to normal, if that's even possible.”

Mom finally smiles. “That's what I want for you too.”

“But let's just say it's not possible. If I had to fight, did Nana say anything about how I was supposed to defeat them?”

Mom shakes her head. “I wish I could help you more.”

“It's okay.” For now, it's enough to know that I'm not alone in this. The fact that my mother and I have even had this conversation is a miracle itself.

I hug my mom.

I spend the next three hours researching. There's some information online. I find the story of the Milesians taking the earth from the gods and sending them to the underworld, but nothing about
how
the gods were made to stay there.

Hadn't Austin said he'd been personally banished for a thousand years? So it must be possible, even now, to banish him. To stop him from trying to spark this war with the Sons. To keep the gods safely in the underworld.

I've found my hypothesis. My theory.

I've even tested it—with Haley and Christy, when we tried to banish Jonah. The spell didn't work, but that doesn't mean my theory's dead. It just means I need to keep testing it under different conditions.

I find the book I took from Christy. My spine tingles as I flip to the banishment spell.

The introduction states the spell should be performed at a gateway. Didn't Blake say that Avernus was a gateway? I could try the spell if I could get Austin back to Avernus. With Austin gone, I could convince the Sons that I won't fight. That I'm on the side of humans.

At least I can try.

My cell phone starts barking. I consider ignoring it, but then the howling sets in. I grab the phone, intent on turning off the sound, when I see the message flash across the screen. It's from Haley. Short as the message is, it has my full attention.

HELP.

TH
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There's no other message. I race to Magic Beans first. Matt stands behind the counter, cleaning the espresso machine with a damp washcloth.

“Is Haley here?”

He shakes his head. “She got off an hour ago. Her boyfriend picked her up.”

Boyfriend?
Austin.
Shit. This is not good.

Blake storms into the shop, his eyes wild. “Are you okay?” He flips a silk strand from the beanstalk out of the way.

I feel his concern mixing with my own, and it's not helping. “Haley's in trouble.” I hold up my phone and show him the message.

“Thank God. I thought it was you.”

“I have to find her.”

Blake follows me out of the shop. “I'm coming with you. I have a bad feeling.”

“She's with Austin.”

“It's not like they haven't gone out before. You don't think he's going to hurt her?”

“You're the one with the bad feeling.” I spin away from him and head toward the Blue Box. He grabs my arm, stopping me.

“I'll drive.”

I don't question it. I'm going to need all the help I can get. “Can you call Joe?”

Blake nods. “Any ideas where they went?”

“Maybe Avernus?” I can't help but hope so. Two birds with one stone. “Haley told me he took her to the beach once.”

“I don't know if a pureblood human could get in there. At least not alive.”

“
The beach, then. He'll want to be close to home.” His real home.

Blake calls Joe and tells him to meet us at the beach.

I wait until we're in the car and driving before I ask the question that's been on my tongue since the moment Blake showed up. “Why are you here?”

“I told you. I thought you were in trouble. I can't explain it. Something's not right.”

“What do you care?” As I say the words there's a slicing pain in my stomach, only eclipsed by the sinking feeling in my heart. “I'm nothing to you.” I know he still thinks I set him up to be killed by the other Seventh Daughters.

I wait for his reaction, practically begging for him to deny it. At the very least I hope for righteous anger, something strong I can use to distract me from the grief that's already ripping at me from the inside.

There's no denial. No anger. His reaction is far more disturbing. He glances at me, his eyes sad. Pitiful. Then I feel what I should've felt from the moment he arrived: the wall between us, solid as the stacked stones in the field in my vision, piled high and packed with clay dried harder than cement.

I have to work hard to sense the resignation I can see in his eyes. He's past being angry with me. Way past. He's walled me off. Doing everything he can to keep me out.

I laugh, a harsh sound that doesn't mask the pain behind it. Anger, I can use. I gather the slings and arrows that have been tearing around my chest and prepare to fire. “I don't know why you're so disappointed in me. You always knew what I was. Why wouldn't I return the favor and let my sisters do my dirty work for me? It would've been poetic justice if they'd killed you.”

He doesn't take the bait. He looks straight ahead in silence, the wall in place, no sign that I'm breaking through.

“Of course I sent Sasha and Sherri to kill you. That's what you think, right? Which explains why they had no idea what they were doing. Obviously they came to die as martyrs. I mean, if you know Sherri Milliken, you know what a selfless person she is. And Sasha … ” My voice trails off and my anger suddenly seems so pointless.

Sasha is dead. I may not have been the one to send her into that den of Sons, but her blood is on my hands all the same. I could have warned her. I could've told her how the Sons would use their power to kill, taught her how to fight them. I could've talked her out of going after them in the first place. I did nothing.

In a way, Blake is right about me. I betrayed him. I betrayed Sherri and Sasha. I betrayed myself. I sat passively by and did nothing until it was too late. Too late to help the Seventh Daughters. Too late to help Blake.

So I didn't kill him. I didn't set him up to be killed.

I didn't choose him, either.

Blake's voice is quiet. “Were you close to her?”

I shake my head. “I met her once. The night Jonah attacked me. When you picked me up in Mira Mesa.”

He nods. There's another tense silence before he speaks again.

“You don't get it, do you? I'm here because I thought you were in trouble. You still are. And whether I want it to or not, it still matters to me that you're okay.” He laughs then. “Who am I kidding? I want it to matter.”

He doesn't say anything else. He just reaches across the car and takes my hand. As his fingers lace with mine, the wall comes down with a crash. I feel him all at once, a flood of sensation. Anger, disappointment, and pain are there, but they're not his. My dark emotions are mixing with something else, something that threatens to overtake them. Not quite hope—it's richer than that. It's the most powerful magic I've ever felt, filling me with such force that I almost smile.

“You're as much a part of me as breathing,” he says. “I'm tired of pretending you're not.”

I let out a breath. “So don't.”

The car stops at a light. Blake looks at me then. Really looks. And it's not just that he sees me. Or even that he likes what he sees. There is something else behind his eyes.

He doesn't say anything at first, and for a moment I think maybe he won't. That he doesn't have to. The stoplight flashes green, reflecting off the windshield, but the car doesn't move. Blake closes his eyes and then opens them again. Then he leans forward, bringing his lips so close to mine that they're nearly touching. He exhales; I feel the hot breeze against my mouth. “Do you feel it?” he asks.

The emotion that fills me is so potent, so full, so pure, that putting a name to it would diminish it somehow. My heart expands to soak it all in, until I can't tell where Blake begins and I end.

“Yes,” I say.

His lips finally touch mine. And in the moment, I believe.