My familiars and Scarlet have all followed me down and into the kitchen. Binx winds around my feet, and Freya and Pandora are sitting on the counter, expectantly looking at me. Scarlet runs around, jumping up at me.
“When have I ever not fed you?” I ask and am reminded that I’m much more of a cat person than a dog person. I get the coffee going and then make my familiars and hellhound something to eat.
I take a blanket from off the back of the couch, wrap it around my shoulders, and go back into the kitchen, waiting for my coffee to finish brewing. Then I pour myself a generous mug and go onto the back porch, leaving the door cracked so Scarlet can come out when she’s done eating.
“Julian,” I whisper, looking up at the sky. “Where are you?” I take a sip of coffee and wait, though at this point I don’t expect an answer. “I wish there was a way to call you,” I sigh and sit on the first step, slowly taking another drink of hot coffee. “You’re supposed to be watching over me, not ignoring me.” I sink my teeth into my bottom lip and slowly shake my head, unable to help the sinking feeling that something bad happened.
Michael—my father—isn’t able to sneak out of Heaven and come to Earth without it being noticed. But Julian can…and has. Where is he? I really could have used him a few days ago. If not to help break the curse but to just be there for me.
He’s family, after all, and I—
“Holy shit.”
I turn, looking in the house. “I do have family.”
Pandora, who’s the first one done eating, trains her eyes on me, giving me a look that says duh.
“I know you’re my family,” I go on, setting the coffee on the porch. “And Lucas is my husband, and I have Kirsty, Evander, and Tabatha…but I have a mother. Well, had. But she came from a family. What if I have a cousin? Or grandparents.” Tears suddenly prick the corners of my eyes. My mother was a witch. I could have witch relatives in another coven.
The thought is both overwhelming and joyous.
“Stop,” I tell myself, knowing I’m thinking too far ahead. “How the hell would I even explain myself to them?” I look at the simple silver bracelet around my wrist. Did my mother’s family know she was even pregnant? If they did, I don’t think they knew she was carrying a half-human, half-angel baby.
How did they think she died?
I close my eyes and blow out a slow breath, trying to tell myself it doesn’t matter. I have no idea who my mother is. All I know is I share a striking resemblance to her.
She was a witch.
Her name was Callista.
And she somehow met and fell in love with an archangel.
I still have more questions than answers, though I’m sure my mother was wonderful. She had to be for a freaking archangel to take notice.
“Where the hell are you, Dad?” I ask, looking back up at the sky. Then I remember Lucifer saying he heard my prayers to my father. Can the other angels hear them, too?
Lucifer was listening, specifically, for me. The others don’t know about me…yet.
“If I hadn’t just left my coven,” I start, picking up my coffee mug again, “I’d go back to university and start a witch version of 23 and Me. Then I could locate my mother’s side of the family.” I flick my eyes up again. “Or you could just tell me,” I say through gritted teeth. If only there was a way to summon angels. “Wait a minute,” I say out loud as another thought occurs to me.
Pandora and Binx trot out onto the porch, sitting on either side of me. “You can summon demons. Surely you can summon angels, too, right?” I take another sip of my coffee, mind whirling. “I channeled something and drew a sigil on Lucas’s chest when I was trying to bind the curse. Sigils are needed for demonic summoning. They’re on different ends of the spectrum, but I don’t see why you couldn’t summon angels.”
I get up, blanket slipping from my shoulders. I hastily reach down and grab it, hurrying into the house. There is nothing in my Book of Shadows about angels, and even the Academy’s library is lacking books about them. I have no idea where to start my research, but a good old-fashioned internet search couldn’t hurt.
Rushing into the office, I look for a notebook and pen out of my desk drawer. I didn’t use the office all that much before, and if this room wasn’t so small, I’d have set it up as a formal living room or something. Lucas has taken it over, and I shuffle through some of his papers, careful not to knock them off the desk as I search for something to write on.