Spells of Blood and Kin (27 page)

 … and that made him remember that his mouth was currently pressed to the forearm of the man who'd seriously fucked up Nick's life and that maybe Nick wasn't going to make a great first impression.

Nick stood up and wiped his mouth on the back of his hand and said, “Sorry.” He couldn't think of what else to add—
Sorry I'm doing unspeakable things with another dude in your kitchen?
—and he just laughed a little, nervously.

The new girl turned to the witch and said, “Well. Now I can see why you haven't wanted to introduce me to your friends.”

English. She was English. Too awesome.

“That's Nick, and that's Gus,” Lissa said, pointing. “
Don't
offer to shake, Nick. That's disgusting. This is my sister, Stella, who you are not going to mess with.”

“Wow,” said Nick to Lissa. “It's like you can read my mind.” And then he remembered that she was supposed to be a witch, and maybe she really could read his mind, and the humor fell right out of him.

Lissa's eyes held his as she said, “Nick and Gus just came to take Maksim back to his place, because he's had a bit of an accident. They were just leaving.”

And damn it, she was a real witch, because in about five seconds flat, Nick found himself on the porch of her house, with Maksim propped up between himself and Gus, and the door shutting firmly behind them.

MAY 26

  
WANING GIBBOUS

Stella waited, arms crossed, while Lissa shut the door and washed her hands and poured a glass of water.

“I had an idea,” Stella said, just when Lissa thought she might not speak. “A bit of a crazy idea, but you know, I'm open-minded. I could sort of maybe believe there are things in the world that are stranger than philosophy—or whatever it was from Shakespeare; I think I mangled it. And you know what? My crazy idea? It wasn't even half as weird as seeing these people drinking each other's blood in your kitchen.”

“I didn't know they did that,” Lissa managed.

“What, you never read
Dracula
? Oh, wait, I guess they're not vampires because of the part where they didn't burst into flames when they walked out the door—but seriously, you can't pass off the Russian Mafia thing on me anymore, because I know for a fact that being in the Russian Mafia does not make people drink blood.”

“I really didn't know,” Lissa said. “Honest to God. Baba told me Maksim was
kin,
and at first, I thought she meant he was related to us somehow.”

“Wait a second. I have a vampire stepfamily?”

“That's not what I said—”

“To go with my witch stepsister. I guess it all makes sense now.”

“Wait. How did you know?”

“Do you think I'm completely daft?” Stella cried. “You have an entire bloody library of magic books. Just because I can't read Russian—there are, like, pentacles and things all over them, for Christ's sake. I mean, I didn't think it actually
worked.
I thought maybe you were one of those people who believe in crystals and all that too, but clearly, if there are vampires—”

“They're not vampires.” Lissa set her glass down roughly enough to spill cool water over her hand. “I don't think. They're people. Really old, violent, scary people.”

“Nick doesn't look very old.”

“He's not. He's brand new. Maksim just infected him, or whatever you call it.”

“Whoa,” Stella said. “That must be a mindfuck.”

“Yeah. Wait. Stop. You do
not
go there. He is not your new fantasy boyfriend.”

“What? Come on, Lissa, I just met him! I only meant he doesn't look as scary as all that, not like the other two.”

“Well, he is.”

“I didn't see you hiding under the table while these scary people were making out in your kitchen.”

“They were not making out.”

“Whatever. You've been having them over for breakfast. All the time when I'm not around. Don't you think I notice how many eggs this house goes through? Who knew vampires liked omelets?”

“They're not vampires,” Lissa said again, weakly.

“If they're so bloody dangerous,
explain
to me,” Stella said. “Tell me what you're doing with them. Tell me the whole goddamned story. Give me my two weeks' notice if you have to, just
talk
to me.”

Lissa gulped in a breath that hurt her chest. “Okay. Okay. Hang on. I will … I'll tell you. I just need…”

“A stiff drink,” Stella decided. “A nice, strong G&T, and then we'll settle in to share the weirdest family secrets
ever
.”

 

Eight

MAY 26

  
WANING GIBBOUS

“Wow,” said Stella. She squinted into the bottom of her glass. “I don't think there's enough gin in the world.”

“You asked.” Lissa shivered a little at a breath of cool from the window; night had fallen while they talked.

“I'll get my head around it,” Stella said. “I mean, it's like everything else, right? You think the world is one way, and then you find out it's another way, and you have a few days where you have to keep reminding yourself
that guy I thought I loved is actually a creepy stalker,
and then it kind of integrates itself into your reality, and even if it sucks, you start moving forward.”

“Does it?” Lissa said. “Suck, I mean?”

“The vampire stepfamily?” Stella looked startled. “I know, I know, not really family, not really vampires. But come on—of course it doesn't suck. It's like finding out there's really a Saint Nicholas.”

“But there was really a Saint Nicholas. In history. Wasn't there?”

“Whatever. The point is, magic's real, and people can have superpowers.”

“Superpowers they want to get rid of,” Lissa reminded her.

“I meant you, idiot.”

“Oh.”

“And you're going to show me, right? How you do the magic?”

Lissa shut her eyes. She had already had her three questions of Baba for the month, and none of them had touched upon this.

Though she couldn't quite see how showing Stella the magic could make anything worse. That part was safe enough—came with rules and guidebooks. No. The things she really wanted to keep from Stella were already out there, and she had a dismal feeling that Stella wasn't taking them seriously.

“That shirt,” she said, her mouth dry. “You'll have to change it for something that doesn't have ties or hooks. And your hair, leave it down. And turn off the lights upstairs on your way back. We'll work in the kitchen.”

“Right now?” Stella asked, eyes huge.

“It's the second night after the full moon,” Lissa said. “We have three days for our workings. That's the first rule.”

“Oh my God. I'm going to learn the rules of magic. Look out, Hogwarts, here I come.”

“What?”

“Don't you have
Harry Potter
in Canada? Never mind—it's a book. I'll lend you mine if I can get Mummy to mail it to me.”

“Slow down,” Lissa said, fighting laughter. “I promise you won't think it's very cool once you see it. It's like cooking, only even more boring.”

Stella embraced her, squeezing tight. “It's going to be perfect.” She ran for the stairs, almost skipping.

Lissa put their glasses in the sink, biting her lip on the fear that Baba was going to be furious.

But Baba was not here, and she had left this to Lissa, and Lissa would have to leave it to someone too, wouldn't she? And Stella
liked
it, liked her. Wasn't slamming the door like Dad had done.

“I'm ready,” Stella said, sliding into the kitchen, barefoot and braless in a loose T-shirt. “What are we going to do?”

Lissa stood on the step stool to fetch down the grimoire she wanted. “A remedy,” she said. “Most of it is stuff like this. This one's for Izabela Dmitreeva, who's one of our best customers.”

“What kind of a remedy? Is she sick?”

“It's for fertility,” Lissa said.

“Does it actually work?” Stella said.

If I get it right this time,
Lissa didn't say. “It would probably work better if she and her husband didn't live with her husband's mother.”

Once she and Stella had the giggles forced back down, they faced each other over the kitchen countertop and the array of grimoires and ingredients and a stack of egg cartons.

“So like I said, it's basically cooking,” she said. “Only a bit weirder. Think of it like cooking Communion wafers or something.”

“I'm Anglican,” Stella said.

“I don't know how they're made, actually. I was trying to prepare you for the part where I have to … sort of pray over them.”

“Seriously?”

Lissa covered her eyes. “It's kind of embarrassing.”

“No. No. You know what's embarrassing? I didn't know you had your own money in Canada. I thought I could use regular money from home.
That's
embarrassing. Saying magic words? That's just quaint and unusual.”

Stella gamely held each egg and dabbed it with paste and then passed it to Lissa, who muttered over it in as unintelligible a manner as she could manage.

“Dad must know you're into this, right? I mean, didn't he used to live here too? Only I don't remember him ever saying anything about witchcraft, and that's not the kind of thing you forget,” Stella said as she piled Lissa's grimoires in an untidy stack at the end of the counter and swept around them with a damp cloth.

Lissa bit the inside of her lip. “He's not totally cool with it,” she said.

“But it's obviously good witchcraft,” Stella said.

“There's a word for it,” Lissa said. “For a witch who works with eggs, I mean. We're called
kolduny
. It just means ‘sorcerer,' basically. If you meet some of the people from church, you might hear them call me
koldun'ia
.”

“Yeah. Maksim said that too. I remember.”

“Anyway, Dad … it wasn't his heritage, you know? Good, bad—didn't matter. He didn't want Baba teaching me. He won't like it if he knows that you're involved.”

“Then we just won't tell him, will we?” Stella said brightly.

Lissa shelved the stacked grimoires in a high cupboard and turned back to Stella, who was setting the last batch of eggs carefully in their carton. “Thanks,” she said. “For your help. Do you want to come with me later this week when I drop them off?”

“Gah!” said Stella, fumbling an egg.

“Okay, I guess that can wait. The church ladies will be scandalized anyway. They'll think it's all wrong that you're not my full sister.”

“Look what I did,” Stella said mournfully, pointing at the mess on the floor.

“Don't get that on your hand,” Lissa said.

Stella jerked her hand back. “I could be fertile just by touching it? Well, I guess it makes sense, if you have to have them all the time. There's only so many fried eggs a person can eat, anyway.”

“Raw,” Lissa said.

Stella shuddered, gingerly wiping up broken yolk with a paper towel. “Now I get why you were laughing.”

“Welcome to the glamorous world of real magic.”

“Shut up, or I'll give you fertility,” Stella said, brandishing the paper towel. “Oh my God. I just figured out why you're so weird about dating Rafe. How do you come out as a witch?”

“I told him my hobby was Russian folklore,” Lissa admitted. “You know, in case he's ever curious about my books.”

“That's … not bad. He might buy it. As long as you can persuade your freak friends not to drink blood in front of him.”

“Shut up.”

“Aww. You told me to shut up,” Stella said, grinning. “It's like we're real sisters now.”