The old gargoyle was the one to speak first.
“We got word that your father was seen in Alaska.”
I cocked an eyebrow. Really? Then why didn’t they catch him themselves? They should have sent a team, hired the Unseelie…
“Do you know anything about this?”
I shook my head. “No. Alaska is not among my preferred travel destinations.”
The man rubbed his temple. “Miss Morningstar, we tasked you with finding him and bringing him to justice. Please tells us you haven’t been wasting our time and yours.”
I sighed. “With all due respect, you realize that catching him is a waste of time, right? Unless he’s decided that he doesn’t want to be a Grim Reaper anymore, I don’t see what we could do about him. And I promise you that whoever told you about Alaska is lying or had him confused with someone else. I am willing to bet my life that he’s not in this universe anymore. He jumped the first time he got the chance. He’s gone.”
“If we’re lucky, maybe he never comes back,” the vampire woman murmured.
“We’d be left with only twenty-one Grim Reapers,” the angel said.
“Twenty-one have been reaping for the past few months, and the world hasn’t ended.”
“The Violent Reapers are working long hours…”
“Maybe the solution is to end wars and school shootings. Then, we wouldn’t need as many Grim Reapers.”
“This conversation isn’t leading anywhere,” the gargoyle cut them off. “Miss Morningstar, if you say he’s in a parallel dimension, what have you done about it?”
“Nothing. I lost my ability to dream jump. I don’t have a solution for you. I don’t even know why you’re calling me here anymore, expecting things from me.”
“Who should we be calling, then? You’re the only one who can solve the mystery that is Valentine Morningstar. You’re his only daughter.”
The temptation to shrug and wave them off again was strong, but this was my chance. The truth was that I was bored of them. Before, in year one, and maybe even year two, I was fascinated with the Supernatural Council, thinking it was this mighty institution that watched over the supernatural world and made sure humans were safe around us, oblivious to our existence. Then my father burst in, scared the shit out of them, and then year three was such a sad mess that I finally had to accept that this Council, just like any governing body in the human world, was overrated and useless. All they did was lounge around their fancy table, listen to people complain, and spend their every waking moment talking and talking, as if moving their lips and making words come out solved anything. Still, they had power. They only had to be convinced to use it.
“There are other dream jumpers in the world. Get a team together, map the parallel universes, and find my mother. Katia Angelov knows Morningstar better than anyone. She’s been living with one of his doppelgangers for the past twenty years. She must have answers to questions you haven’t even thought of yet.”
“Dream jumpers are human,” the demoness said in a monotone voice. “We can’t bring humans into this.”
I rolled my eyes. I was so tired of hearing this excuse.
“We know how much you miss your mother, Mila,” the demoness continued. “But she chose to leave this universe for a better one. She chose to stay there even when she found out that you are still alive.”
“She didn’t choose. He forced her!”
“She can still dream jump, can’t she?”
“I don’t know,” I whispered. “I don’t know anymore. All I know is that she can help us, if only you made the tiniest effort to get to her.”
The councilors whispered amongst themselves for a minute.
“I think I know why she hasn’t come to see you,” Corri said, her whole face pressed to my ear.
“Not now.”
“Just saying… Don’t be mad at her. She would’ve, but I don’t think she can.”
This whole thing was useless. These people were useless. We wasted some more time arguing about nothing of real importance, then they finally told me I was free to go.
“One dream jumper,” I insisted. “Just one. Okay, forget about my mother, but maybe he or she could find a parallel dimension where Morningstar was retired, and learn how.”
It was no use. Very few humans knew about the supernatural world, and they’d already interrogated them, only to find out they weren’t nearly as gifted as I used to be. Camilla Ivanov was one of them. I gave up.