“I’m just reading.” She tried to avoid confrontations with Hunting. He was vicious and cruel, yet there was always a thread of truth in his words. Truth she tried desperately to ignore.
Hunting leaned against the door, a cigarette hanging between his lips. “I’ll never understand why Grand-father Abraham wastes his time with you. Do you have any idea how many Casters would kill to have him as a teacher?” Hunting shook his head.
She was tired of being bullied. “Why am I a waste?”
“You’re a Dark Caster pretending to be Light. A Cataclyst. If that isn’t a waste, I don’t know what is.”
The words stung, but Sarafine tried to hide it. “I’m not pretending.”
Hunting laughed, baring his canines. “Really? Have you told your Light Caster husband about your secret meetings down here? I wonder how long it would take him to turn on you.”
“That’s none of your business.”
Hunting dropped his cigarette into an empty soda can on the desk. “I’ll take that as a no.”
Sarafine felt her chest tighten, and for a second everything went black.
The desk caught fire just as Hunting pulled his hand away.
There was no warning. One minute she was angry at Hunting; the next, the desk was going up in smoke.
Hunting coughed. “Now, that’s more like it.”
Sarafine scrambled to put out the fire with an old blanket. Predictably, Hunting didn’t help. He disappeared into Abraham’s private study down the hall. Sarafine stared at her hands, covered in black ash. Her face was probably filthy, too. She couldn’t go home to John like this.
She wandered down the hall toward the small bathroom. But as soon as she came within a few feet of Abraham’s door, she heard voices.
“I don’t know why you’re so obsessed with that kid.” Hunting’s voice was bitter. “Who cares if he can go out in the daylight? He’s barely old enough to walk, and Silas will probably kill him before he can be useful.” He was talking about the boy Abraham told her about when they first met. The one who was a little older than Lena.
“Silas will control his
temper and do what I tell him,” Abraham snapped. “Have some vision, boy. That child will be the next generation. An Incubus with all of our strengths and none of our weaknesses.”
“How can you be sure?”
“You think I picked his parents by accident?” Abraham didn’t like being questioned. “I knew exactly what I was doing.”
For a moment there was silence. Then Abraham spoke again. “It won’t be long before the Casters are out of the way. I’ll see it in my lifetime. I promise you that.”
Sarafine shivered. A part of her wanted to run for the door and never look back. But she couldn’t. She had to stay for Lena.
She had to stop the voices.
When Sarafine got home, John was in the living room.
“Shh. The baby’s asleep.” He kissed her on the cheek as she sat down next to him on the couch. “Where have you been?”
For a second she considered lying, telling him she was at the library or walking in the park. But Hunting’s words mocked her. “I wonder how long it would take him to turn on you.” He was wrong about John.
“I was in the Tunnels.”
“What?” John sounded as if he thought he had misunderstood her.
“I met one of my relatives, and he told me things about the curse. Things I didn’t know. The second Natural born into the Duchannes family can Claim herself. Lena can choose.” It all came tumbling out, so many things she had longed to share with him.
John was shaking his head. “Wait a minute. What relative?”
There was no stopping now. “Abraham Ravenwood.”