Chosen (Slayer 2)

Ruth is already working on next year’s Christmas scarves for the castle. The current one must be sitting unfinished, her needles still in it, waiting for her wrinkled, deft fingers—

The silence in the car is palpable. Everyone is hurt and everyone is angry. At Artemis, yeah, but also at me. And I don’t blame them. I couldn’t have known she was going to attack the castle, but I absolutely made it possible.

Rhys clears his throat, Cillian taps his fingers on the armrest, and Doug, who made certain I was sitting between him and Jade, twitches but keeps his eyes firmly on the window, staring out at the dark forest only now softening with the dawn.

It’s a new day. A terrible, empty new day, ushered in with loss and failure.

We pull up to Cillian’s and Rhys puts the car in park. It’s obviously hard for him, but he turns around to address me. “We should talk about the plan to get Leo back.”

“Didn’t you want him locked up?” Jade asks. “Why do you care if Artemis took him? Our plan should be to go after her, not him.”

I want to argue, but I have no right to. Not on this subject.

Rhys scowls. “Yes, I did want him locked up. By us, so we could take care of him. I didn’t want him kidnapped by these fanatics for whatever nefarious purpose they have in mind.”

“No one in a black cloak has ever been good news,” Doug mutters in agreement.

“Magicians?” Jade offers.

“Case in point.” But Doug smiles, and Jade brightens at this softening.

“It doesn’t matter,” I say. “Artemis will be wherever Leo is, so the goal doesn’t change. And Rhys is right. Whatever they want him for, we have to stop. Our only hope is that Cillian’s mom can give us a lead to track down Artemis and the zealots.”

“Because someone let the zealots steal our book that could have shed light on the problem.” Rhys’s jaw twitches. Normally, Cillian would reach over to soothe him, but Cillian has his arms folded tight, his face unreadable. I don’t know who in the car he’s most angry at. If it’s me, he’s not alone. I’m most angry at me too.

Cillian pulls out the necklace we took from the cloakers and holds it in his palm. I know how much it’s going to cost him to face whatever we’re going to find out. It means letting go of his memories of his father, potentially replacing them with bad things. His mother asked me to keep him away from it all, but thanks to my choices, that’s not an option anymore.

“Cillian.” Rhys lifts a hand toward him. Rhys is pale, and his hand shakes slightly, but he seems okay in spite of having donated so much blood. Cillian takes Rhys’s hand and squeezes it.

“Let’s do this.” We follow Cillian inside. The Littles must have been bundled into Cillian’s room with Jessi, and this early it’s still quiet. But the light in the kitchen is a warm island in the chilly ocean of the dawn. Cillian’s mother dances around the kitchen humming as she prepares food. We shuffle in. The space isn’t large enough for all of us, so Doug and Jade sit at the table for three, while Rhys, Cillian, and I block the entrance and exit to the kitchen. I don’t know if we stage it this way on purpose, but she can’t get out without going through us.

Jessi appears on the stairs and glares at us all. “Be quiet,” she hisses, before disappearing back upstairs.

“Oh, hello!” Esther beams and her eyes sweep over us. They pause on Doug, but only long enough to register mild surprise and then move on. She does know about demons, after all. She continues bustling about, pulling things from cupboards and the fridge. “I wasn’t sure what the little ones would like, so I’m making a bit of everything. I thought today we’d take a picnic to the beach. It will be cold, but I’ll bundle them up. Then we can stop by the shop for a treat if Jessi says it’s okay. She’s quite intense, isn’t she? But I love the shop. It’s so well done, Cillian. You really changed that space for the better.” She seems genuinely happy to have the Littles here, excited at the prospect of taking them for a fun outing. Gods, don’t let her be secretly evil. Please let this mom be a good one.

Cillian leans against the counter and folds his arms. “That’s great, Mum. Do let us know if you decide to run away to Tibet or Madagascar or Shangri-la as a change of plans, though. We’ll need at least five minutes’ notice.”

Her reflexive smile is tight and defensive. “Give me a moment and I can make you all eggs. You still like them sunny-side up, right?”

Cillian doesn’t answer. He pulls out the necklace instead. She flinches as it winks in the light. “What is this?”

“Toast?” Her glance at me is accusatory. I wasn’t supposed to bring Cillian into it.

“It’s too late,” I say. “I’m sorry. We have nowhere else to turn.”

Cillian moves to block her path to the toaster oven. “This is our only lead. You owe me this. If we don’t find these people, our friend will die.”

His mom’s hands tremble as she reaches up and smooths the wrap around her braids. “What—what can this have to do with your friend?”

“The people wearing this symbol took him. And it can’t be a coincidence that Da’s puzzle is the same pattern. Was he involved with this before he died? Were you? Are you? Because they’re all zealots, and you’ve spent a lot of time trying to find God or religion or whatever.”

The kettle whistles, and Cillian’s mom shuffles around him to pull it off the heat. She pours five cups of tea and pauses on the sixth, raising an eyebrow at Doug. He shakes his head, and she sets the kettle back on the stove. We each get a mismatched mug. I take Jade hers, not wanting to let Cillian’s mom away from where we have her cornered. Jade’s face is bruised, her lip swollen, and I catch Doug staring at the damage with an unreadable expression.

Cillian’s mom wraps her hands around her mug and turns to face us, leaning against the counter with the same physical posture I’ve seen Cillian do a hundred times. “Your father isn’t dead.”

Cillian chokes on his tea. “What?”

“In my defense, I never said he was dead.”