Thief of Lies (7 page)

Nick returned, balancing a small steaming teapot in one hand and a cup and saucer in the other. He placed them both in front of Nana.

“That was fast,” Afton said.

“It’s just hot water and tea bags.” Nick pulled over another chair and leaned back in it, balancing on two legs. “What’d I miss?”

“Nana’s a witch,” Afton whispered.

“So nothing new, then,” he said, slamming the chair back on all fours.

Nana cleared her throat, giving Nick a stern look. “May I continue?”

“Um, sure, have at it.” Nick picked up his fork and drummed it on the table. When Nick was nervous, he tended to get fidgety. During tests at school, the teachers were always on him to settle down.

“Without distraction.”

Nick paused mid-tap. “Oh, sorry.”

“Thank you,” Nana said. “Sentinels are born with a certain gene that enables them to create light and weapon globes for battles. The Monitors can detect the gene, which allows them to track a Sentinel while jumping through the gateways. After your mother fled the havens, Gia, she sought my help. She told me people with ill intentions were searching for her and her baby. I used a branding charm to shield the two of you from discovery. It’s how you got the scar.”

My hand flew to my chest. “You
branded
a baby?”

“I’d never harm a child. I applied a numbing potion to the area beforehand.” She dabbed the corner of her mouth with her napkin, avoiding eye contact with me, then cleared her throat again. “As I was saying, your mother and father were both Sentinels. The wizard laws forbid Sentinels from having children together because a seer prophesied that a child from such a union would herald the coming end for both the human and Mystik worlds. Marty fled to keep you safe.”

Nana removed the top of the teapot, grabbed the tags tethered to the two bags inside, and dunked them up and down. Her lips pressed into a tight line. She did that whenever she couldn’t get up the nerve to deliver bad news.

“Just say it, Nana,” I urged.

“It is believed that you are that child.”

Chapter Seven

“I
’m…
what
?” I knocked my glass over.

Nick watched the river of juice course across the table. “I think she said you’re the Doomsday Child.”

Nana and Afton grabbed napkins from the silver dispenser on the table and caught the flow before the orange stream cascaded over the table’s edge.

“
Nick
.” Afton shook her head and dabbed at the table. “Can you be any more insensitive?”

He scowled. “What the hell? She’s not the only one dealing with all the shit going down, lately.”

“Watch your language, young man,” Nana warned.

“I’m sorry,” I said, still stunned. “I’ve made a mess.”

“Nonsense, it was an accident, is all.” Nana added her napkins to Afton’s pile.

I rubbed my temples to soothe a blossoming headache. “Let’s say I believe you. Why didn’t Arik and the others know about me? And now that they know, aren’t I in more danger from them than anyone else? And…and…if you were hiding me, how did Carrig find you?”

“So many questions.” Nana pursed her lips. “Firstly, only Arik and Asile’s high wizard, Merl, know the truth, and they will protect you. Your birth may have put the end in motion, but they believe you’re the key to stopping it, as well. The others are unaware of your parentage. You must never tell anyone who your birth father is. The wizards and the Mystiks believe the presage hasn’t been born yet, and we shall keep it that way for as long as possible. To answer your other question, Cleo is my spy, you might say. She informed me about your phone conversations with Nick and Afton—the ones where you rehashed the accidental jump to Paris and the narrow escape with a hunter on the subway. I figured you were in danger and your best protection was Carrig. I contacted him through an address your mother once gave me for emergencies. Thankfully, he received my note.”

“Cleo?” I said. “My cat?” My head started to pound. More lies. Branding spells. And furry spies. Can I trust anyone?

“I can talk to animals, especially cats. Most witches can. You’ve heard of familiars, right? Baron is mine. Cleo belongs to your aunt. We sent her to watch over you”—she rolled a teaspoon handle between her fingers—“to be my eyes, so to speak.”

“Gia, it’s a great honor to be a Sentinel,” Carrig said and puffed out his chest.

“I know something of Sentinels from video games,” Nick said. “They’re badass guards that protect things.”

“’Tis sort of the idea—” Carrig seemed irritated by Nick’s interruption. “They were created from knights, and have very little magic compared to wizards but are great fighters.”

“Wicked,” Nick muttered. “So it’s an actual word?”

“
Duh
, it’s in the dictionary.” Afton rolled her eyes. “It actually means guard. I mean, seriously, how
do
you get good grades?”

“For Jaysus sakes,” Carrig growled. “Will you stop your blathering and let a man think?”

We all nodded.

Nana took my hands. “Are you doing okay, dear?”

“How can I be fine? My whole world just… I don’t know.” I lowered my head, trying to garner the strength to be brave. “Can you tell me something? Did my mother ever love Pop?”

She squeezed my shaking hands. “Of course she did, sweetie. Your pop fell in love with her the moment I introduced them, and shortly after, he asked her to marry him. He was so delighted to be a father to her newborn daughter. You’re his entire world, Gia.”

“You said
he
loved her, but did
she
love him?”

Nana released my hands, lifted her cup to her lips, and put it down without taking a sip. “I believe she cared deeply for him, but it couldn’t replace the love she had for Carrig. It was that love that caused her death.”

Carrig choked on a mouthful of toast. “What?”

“We were out shopping, Marty, Gia, and I,” Nana said. “Little Gia had darted into the busy street. Marty caught her and handed her to me. Before Marty stepped up onto the curb, something across the street distracted her. Her face brightened, and she tried to cross traffic.” Her voice cracked. “That’s when a van struck her. The last thing she spoke was your name, Carrig. I believe she saw you.”

“It wasn’t me. I’ve never been here before today.” Tears tumbled from Carrig’s eyes. He lowered his head and wiped them away with his fists.

Not one of us moved or said a word. When it seemed he wouldn’t recover from the news, I placed my hand over his balled fist, and he looked at me with surprise. I knew how he felt.

I removed my hand and turned my attention to Nana. “I guess Pop doesn’t know about any of this, huh?”

“Marty never told him, figuring the fewer people who knew your true identity, the less likely you’d be found.” Nana lifted the teacup again, and again she placed it down without taking a sip. “She feared if the havens found you, they would train you to be the force the seer foretold.”

“’Tis not clear what be your abilities,” Carrig interrupted, fully recovered except for the red rimming his eyes. “No one has had two Sentinel parents before.”

“So I’m a freak, right?”

“Now then, don’t be flattering yourself. You’re merely special, is all.” A hint of a smile crept over Carrig’s lips. “Our professor of wizardry will determine just how special that be when he meets you.”

Nana removed a black travel case from her tote and then retrieved some sort of hand-held tool from it.

A shocked expression crossed Afton’s face. “Is that a tattoo gun?” She’d know the tools. The year before, she had been obsessed about getting a butterfly on her foot, but her parents wouldn’t let her.

“It is.” Nana pulled out a power cord and handed it to Nick. “Will you plug this into the wall, dear?”

“Nana, people are watching.” I imagined someone using a cell phone to record her and post it on YouTube.

“Don’t worry. I’ve placed an illusion spell around our table. People only see us eating breakfast and talking.”

Nick gave the plug a curious eye, shrugged, and stretched it across to the wall.

“What are you doing?” I asked Nana.

“I’m setting up.” She reached into her tote and retrieved a set of rubber gloves, a handful of wrapped needles, and several bottles with colored ink. Next, she pulled out a jar with a small amount of clear liquid inside, a spray bottle, and various other items I’d never seen before.

“Wow, Nana Kearns is a tattoo artist,” Nick joked.

“Well, I find branding people archaic,” Nana said, as she worked at putting her tools together. “Plus, with the activists in the Mystik world preaching to witches to stop cruelty to humans, I switched to tattooing charms into the skin instead of branding them.”

I glanced at the other tables. No one paid attention to Nana and her makeshift tattoo parlor. A girl coming from the bathroom walked by and stumbled over the cord stretched across the floor. She looked back, shrugged, and continued to her table.

“Who are you inking a charm on?” I asked.

Nana held up the bottle containing the clear liquid. “There’s barely enough potion left for two. I got the shielding spell from an ancient spell book I found in Romania. Ruth Ann from my tea club borrowed it, thinking it was a simple spell book. Your aunt Eileen got it back for me. When she returned with the book, someone had torn out the page with the recipe and Ruth Ann had vanished. There are some dangerous spells in that book. To be safe, I placed a charm on it. It won’t leave the house again, you can be certain of that.”

“Two tattoos will be enough,” Carrig said, stopping Nana’s rambling.

“
Naaana
. Who are you putting tattoos on?”

“Afton and Nick, of course.”

“Oh, no you’re not,” Nick said.

Afton’s eyes fixed on the needle Nana was attaching to the gun. “My dad will bust my butt if I get one!”

“Nonsense. You have no choice if you want to live,” Nana said, as if Afton had just refused sugar for her tea.

Carrig turned in his chair to face Afton and Nick. “You wouldn’t want any beasts like the one you encountered in Paris finding you, wouldja?”

“It only stings a bit,” Nana added. “That’s what the girl said, anyway. I normally do evil-eye protections, luck charms, and things of that matter.” Nana twisted the black ink bottle into the gun. “I’m getting good at tats.”

Needles freaked me out, and this one looked extra sharp. “Uh–um– What girl?”

“I’ll tell her as you get about working on Nick,” Carrig said. “It’s nearing twelve, and Afton’s da will be here shortly. And Nick should go with her.”

“I can’t go home,” Nick said. “Those guys know where I live.”

“They only know the neighborhood you live in. Hunters be like puppets with no brains. If they can’t sense you anymore, they can’t find you.”

Nick looked doubtfully at Carrig. “I hope you’re right.”

“I am,” Carrig said. I believed the conviction in his voice.

“Okay.” Nick swallowed hard as he unbuttoned his shirt. “Stick it to me.” He puffed his chest out.

Nana flipped the switch on the tattoo gun and it buzzed angrily to life. She started inking a black line into Nick’s skin. Again, I looked around, but no one seemed aware of the crude tattoo parlor in the middle of the café.

“Right, then, where shall I begin,” said Carrig, rubbing the stubble on his chin. “Every eight years a new generation of Sentinels be born to certain humans with mixed blood who be unaware of their Sentinel ancestry. On the rare occasion, one comes from a wizard with less magic in their bloodline. When a Sentinel is conceived, their changelings begin to grow in the Garden of Life within the fey nation. The changeling be an exact twin of the Sentinel. All Sentinels be having one.”

“Fey nation?” The confusion on Afton’s face mirrored how I felt. “Where is that?”

“It’s in the Twilight realm. A place just beyond this world.”

I gave him a confused look. Or maybe it was disbelief. Because this stuff was crazy. It couldn’t be real. I was about to say just that when he put his hand up to stop me.

“Don’t be saying a word,” he said. “Just listen. About ten days after a Sentinel’s birth, the appointed parent faery switches the baby with his or her changeling. The changeling lives the life of the Sentinel, and the parent faery raises the Sentinel until he or she be old enough to attend one of the academies for training. A human’s changeling never knows what he or she truly be—they simply live the Sentinel’s intended life as their own.”

“That’s cruel,” I said, unable to stay quiet any longer. “How can you take babies away from their mothers?”

“It may seem cold-hearted,” Carrig said, “but the Sentinels protect the libraries and keep both worlds safe. The fey created them long ago by crossing the blood of wizards with knights to protect the human world from the Mystiks. It be a small sacrifice, so it is. Most of the families be unaware of the exchange, anyhow.”

“I bet their mothers know,” I said.

“Truthfully, they don’t. Every hair, freckle, and birthmark be the same on the babies.”

“Okay, then what?” I said. “You know, what happens when a Sentinel finishes her education?”

“When they turn sixteen, they become guards of the libraries, maintaining the safety for all who enter them. They keep the entries into the wizard and Mytik havens secret from the human realm. After eight years of service, they retire, marry their assigned betrothed, and have children.”

“Assigned betrothed?” I repeated.

“To prevent the prophecy, the Wizard Council makes marriage matches for the Sentinels.”

Afton snorted. “That’s pretty archaic, isn’t it?”

“That it be,” he agreed.

Nick wrinkled his nose. “It would suck if you had to marry a dog.”

“Or a dumbass,” Afton added, looking directly at Nick.

Nick was about to fire off some stupid remark, but I interrupted him. “Sixteen is kind of young to risk your life, isn’t it?”

“It’s an ancient system,” Carrig said. “Back then, sixteen was considered adulthood.”

“Then you’re kind of old to be one,” I said.

“I’m a Master Sentinel,” he said. “I remain in service to educate and lead the many groups in my district.”

My mind went back to the changelings. If I was a Sentinel, then I had one. There can’t be someone exactly like me in the world. I’d know it. Feel it.
Wouldn’t I?

I swallowed hard and asked the question I wasn’t sure I wanted the answer to. “Do you mean there’s another me walking around somewhere?” It seemed like his response would never come. When he finally nodded, I blinked in disbelief. “So where’s my changeling now?”

Carrig had a way with dramatics. He had me at the edge of my seat waiting for his answer again. “Your changeling was brought to your home this morning,” he said. “To live your life, while you be trained as a Sentinel. Katy has already tattooed her.”

I bolted out of my seat, the chair falling back and hitting the floor with a clang. “What the
hell
are you talking about? No one’s taking over
my
life.”

N
ana had barely finished inking the black crescent moon charms on Afton’s and Nick’s chests when Mr. Wilson pulled up in front of the café to pick up Afton. Nick hitched a ride home with her, and I was depressed to see them leave. I wasn’t sure when I’d ever see my two best friends again.

I kept playing what Nana told me in my head. That this changeling was only borrowing my life. It was mine, and I would be able to have it back. But could she really be like me? And all she had to do was touch my things to get my memories? To know what I know? My secrets. I felt horribly violated.

My life had been stolen from me in the blink of an eye, and Nana had allowed it to happen. It was as if a dark cloud rolled over my head, suffocating me. I gasped for air. Each breath felt heavy in my lungs. And Pop wouldn’t know a stranger had moved into our home. He’d have Sunday dinners with someone who didn’t know him. Didn’t love him. How cruel was that? I couldn’t let that happen.

Nana’s hand covered mine. “Calm breaths. I’m right here with you.”

I nodded and wiped away a few tears that had slipped from my eyes. Though he was across from me, Carrig’s words sounded far away as he told Nana the plan.