Chapter 9

CHAPTER NINE

VALERIA

A fter the night of Petra's death, I retreated to my bedroom, shut the thick velvet curtains, and closed the door. I emailed excuses to my teachers and silenced my phone. I'd decided I wouldn't face the world until I'd found some way to explain the mysteries that plagued our coven, and the gaping hole Petra had left at its core.

The Book of Shadows was as heavy as a brick and densely populated with inky, black script. Day blended into night and back again as I sat hunched over it by dim lamplight. I read like I was gripped by a strange fever that kept me fixed on those ancient pages, inspecting each one for any clue, any mention of malevolent magic. My eyes burned, but I welcomed the task. It allowed no time for grief. That would come later.

The first entries were written by Delfina Garcia herself: spells in neat, bold letters; rituals for health, for an abundant harvest, even spells to improve gold mining outcomes. All the original coven members had made entries too. Tobias Wiley, Jayden's ancestor, had listed the best spots in the forest to pick wild herbs. Levan Nichols had contributed his thoughts on astrological divination. I couldn't help but wonder about Levan. Had he been anything like Luke? I imagined a quiet man who gazed at the stars, his sharp, handsome features obscuring some private pain.

Even Elizabeth Foster had contributed an entry. My heart leapt when I discovered it, hoping it would hold some clue as to why she lost her magic or why Gwen's had returned. But it was about how to draw power and vitality from the new moon. The key, according to Elizabeth, was to sleep in the forest beneath its light—naked. A haunting image appeared in my mind: Elizabeth's pale shape moving between the trees at night, her hair wild, as the new moon shone above.

Many questions plagued me as I read in those feverish hours, but it had begun to look like, Elizabeth Foster's naked moonbathing was the most scandalous revelation the original coven had to offer. No dark secrets, no prophecies, and no malevolent magic.

My breakthrough didn't come until one dreary Tuesday evening, when I reached the entry of Delfina's granddaughter, Salud. There, in flowery cursive, were the words I'd been looking for.

The Principles of Malevolent Magic, 7 January 1899

We laid our founder, Delfina Garcia, to rest last Saturday. Though she will be sorely missed, I am now free to write about malevolent magic, a topic she forbade our coven even to speak of while she was alive. I will write what I know in hopes that my words might aid future generations of this coven I hold dear. I only wish I knew more.

At our core, witches are neither good nor evil. Inside each of us lies darkness and light. However, some witches possess the ability to use the darkness within for magical purposes. This is malevolent magic, a power so abhorrent and dangerous that those who practice it are shunned by other witches. Fortunately, malevolent magic is very rare. The power is passed through the generations in a small number of ill-fated bloodlines.

While elemental magic is part of the natural order of the universe, malevolent magic is not. Its very existence is at odds with nature, and she pushes back against it. Thus, malevolent witches can wield their power for only a short time before they are drained. Likewise, its rituals cannot be done without a sacrifice, usually the death of something vibrant and beautiful.

Some malevolent witches can control the Mundanes and make them obey their will. Others can summon a deadly spell against their fellow witches. Before my family left our native Mexico, we called it the Xholha, the Shadow Spell. It appears as a wave of shadow as opaque as night. If a witch is struck by the Shadow Spell, she will suffer great pain, and if she is not spared, she will soon die.

The hairs on the backs of my arms stood up. At last, I understood exactly what happened to Petra. She'd died suffering beneath a wave of shadow. A new grief washed over me, and tears blurred my vision as I read on.

I have heard whispers among the elders that a prophecy exists—the foretelling of an event that will tip the balance of the universe in favor of malevolent magic, leaving calamity and destruction in its wake. But alas, Delfina refused to speak of it. She would only assure me that this fate had been averted. My grandmother always had a weariness about her, but when I asked about this prophecy, she looked more sorrowful than I'd ever seen her. The burden of her secrets must have been great indeed. I wish I'd known what they were. Now they go with her to the grave.

The passage ended, and the last words Petra said to me repeated in my head. It's happening again, like it did when Dorado was founded. There's this prophecy ? —

Delfina had thought the danger was over, the secret buried forever. She'd been wrong. The image of Delfina that hung on our wall depicted someone proud and strong, nothing like the miserable woman her granddaughter described. What had changed her? I flipped back to the book's early entries, to Delfina's perfect penmanship. As I did, I noticed charred edges deep in the book's spine as if several pages had been burned away. The burn marks looked as ancient as the paper, as though Delfina had destroyed the words herself. Suddenly, I pictured my mother as she torched the bridge between Gwen's house and ours. The Garcia family, I thought, burning problems out of existence since 1860.

Something else was bothering me, too—another puzzle piece that didn't fit. When the sunfire spell had turned on me in the forest, the witch who killed Petra had pulled the earth out from beneath my feet. It was the jolt I'd needed to shake myself free from my own spell. And though the dirt could have suffocated me, here I was, alive and breathing. I had the strange feeling that I'd been spared intentionally. Why would a killer let me live?

The grandfather clock downstairs struck six. It was almost time to begin the rites of death.

Reluctantly, I shut the book and dressed in the clothes I'd picked out, a beaded black dress and cropped satin jacket. No high priestess robes and dagger sheath tonight. We were going out in public. I hated the somber color of the clothes, but for this ritual, dark and dreary was the only way to go.

Fifteen minutes later, I'd parked my Mercedes in the cemetery lot. The ground was soft, and my shoes sank a little with each step as I headed to the historic section. I glanced warily at the grass, so short it resembled AstroTurf. I wondered why the Mundanes insisted on keeping the cemetery so neat and pretty. Death was neither.

A large old fountain bubbled on the broad cemetery path, its stone angels spitting never-ending streams of water. A general feeling of dampness permeated my surroundings as if the earth was still holding the rain from Gwen's downpour. It'd been a week since that horrible night. A part of me hadn't believed Petra was gone until the Mundanes came with their sirens and searchlights. I'd watched them carry her away on a muddy stretcher. All the while, the rain had poured.

I was sure the doctors had declared some medical explanation for her death—aneurysm, sudden heart failure. Magic would leave no trace they could discover. Only I had felt the deathly aura malevolent magic had left behind.

All the coven families had plots in the oldest section of the cemetery. Somewhere nearby was Delfina Garcia's final resting place, her secrets lost forever beneath the trimmed cemetery grass. A light fog floated among the headstones, and a tall, white monolith in the distance declared sarich in aggressive block letters: Petra's family plot. There, above a freshly laid patch of sod, was Petra's grave.

I approached it, weaving through the other stones, observing the etchings on each. 1902–1956. 1879–1934. 1825–1880. The lives of witches of the past, reduced to a name and two dates. Now Petra's existence would be summed up the same way.

I stared at the cruelly short life etched into cold marble before me. Petra's life. The life I hadn't saved. In a strange way, I felt as if I'd died the day she did. The old Valeria was buried among the trees in the barren forest. Whoever I was now did not feel like her. There was a pain in my heart that allowed no room for the selfish things I used to harbor there. I was freshly turned earth now, waiting for something to grow beneath the soil. I didn't know what would emerge.

I thought of Gwen's tear-streaked face after I'd given her that stupid necklace. Try not being a dick. That was the last piece of advice Petra had given me. But I hadn't taken it. I hadn't even considered it. I would try now, I vowed. If I didn't, then what was I still doing here? Why was I alive when Petra, brave, and genuine, and kind, was gone?

"Hey, am I too early?"

I turned to see Gwen standing behind me, her figure covering the setting sun. The funeral had been miserable. We'd watched Petra's body lowered into the ground as her parents stood still and tearful over the descending casket, but the coven seemed to have an endless series of depressing rituals surrounding death. We'd arrived for round two.

"Yes—I mean, no. I mean, wanna help me set up?"

It amazed me that Gwen was even speaking to me after how I'd treated her the last few…years. Trying to be kind was like using a new, unpracticed muscle. For the first time, I found myself unsure of how to talk to her, as if I could somehow communicate my guilt and regret with a few words of small talk.

If she noticed my weirdness, she didn't acknowledge it. She knelt beside me, and together we removed the candles from my bag. I showed her how to place them around the fresh grave, like a protective circle. Gwen paused as if transfixed by the tombstone, one thin white candle in her hand.

"‘Come! let the burial rite be read—the funeral song be sung!—An anthem for the queenliest dead that ever died so young.'"

"What was that?" I said, the rhyme still ringing in my head.

"Poe," she replied. "He's my favorite. I've spent a lot of time escaping into books when things got hard. Guess it's a habit now, to search for some kind of comfort in familiar words."

"It was beautiful."

"I'm sorry she's gone," Gwen said, setting down the candle and igniting it with a gentle silver flame.

I couldn't name all the things I was sorry for. We sat back on our heels, admiring the array of candles surrounding the tombstone. Gold flames danced on the ones I'd lit, silver on Gwen's, both casting an eerie glow in the darkening night.

"They're all going to think I did this somehow," she said. "I'm the newcomer. I'm the one with the unexplained powers."

"Gwen, when this whole thing began, I wasn't sure I could trust you. But Petra's death proved you're not behind this. I know you, and you're not a killer."

She turned to me with a weak smile. "So you don't think I'm a murderer? That might be the first compliment you've ever given me, and I've gotta say, it's a pretty crappy one."

"Well," I said tentatively, "maybe the next one will be better."

"How stupid." She wiped at her damp eyes. "A girl is dead, and I'm worrying about my own problems."

Guilt overwhelmed me. Guilt over the girl I'd failed to save, the coven I couldn't protect, the magic I had no clue how to fight. The sting of tears threatened to overtake me, and I feared if I began to cry, I would never stop.

An old, familiar impulse hit me. I could hide my pain with hurtful words, some remark that would make Gwen feel the same self-doubt I did. I pushed the idea back down into the dark recesses of my heart. I wasn't going to do that anymore. How dare I, as I knelt on Petra's grave?

Besides, I understood now. Those words wouldn't make me any more capable of solving my problems. And those words wouldn't make Petra any less dead. Instead, I opened my mouth and told her the truth.

"I failed," I said. "I failed Petra, the coven—I'm supposed to be high priestess. But maybe I'm not. Maybe I'm just a kid playing in her mother's clothes."

Saying the words out loud was like bearing my heart to a knife's blade. But instead of cutting me down, Gwen sat there, serenely absorbing my ugliest truths.

"I try to outshine everyone around me because I'm afraid if I don't, they'll see how weak I really am," I went on. "I know I've treated you terribly. I can't tell you how ashamed I am of that."

Gwen didn't speak for a long time.

"You should be ashamed," she said at last. "Being on your bad side has really sucked. And you weren't exactly nice to me before that."

I braced myself against her coming tirade. This was what I deserved.

"You're petty. You're self-centered. You're quick to jealousy?—"

"I know," I said, my eyes stinging with tears.

She put a hand on my shoulder, her expression serious. "But you're not weak. You never have been."

I let her last words resonate. They seemed to warm me as the night air grew colder.

"Now that's a compliment," I said. I turned to her, a million apologies on my lips. "Oh, Gwen, I'm sor?—"

Footsteps sounded behind us. The others had arrived. We whirled around to face them, our moment abruptly over.

Jayden stood at the foot of the grave. His expression was stoic, his eyes dry, but there was something broken in him. I could see it on his face, despite the rose oil and concealer. Petra had been his closest friend, perhaps his only true friend. He was devastated. Behind him stood Luke, tall and solitary in the cemetery fog. Celeste's pale blue eyes darted around as if she believed whoever killed Petra might jump out at her at any moment. Max held a protective arm around his sister. He was the only one not ashamed to cry. And he was ugly-crying, eyes red and nose running as if he was determined to release not only his grief but the rest of ours too.

A strange feeling came over me as I looked at these people I'd known for so long. The night Petra died, Luke and Gwen had been with my mom in the kitchen, safe and dry. But I found myself wondering about the others. What had they been doing that night?

Without being told, they each took a place around Petra's grave. The rites of death didn't require it, but it was as if we each inherently understood that our coven existed in a circle, eternal and unbroken, like the circle carved above our hearts. They were quiet, waiting for me to give some grand proclamation. But I had no wisdom that would make it all make sense. All I had were scant pieces of knowledge. Crumbs, as Petra would have said.

"Before we honor Petra, I want to tell you some things."

I sensed them tense up as I began to tell them what I'd read in the Book of Shadows.

"But who the hell was it?" Max said, wiping angrily at a tear.

"I don't know. The book says very few witches can practice malevolent magic. It's one of those lineage things—you're either born with it, or you're not."

"And none of us were, right?" Celeste asked.

I hated the way they glanced uneasily at each other. The way they seemed to stiffen and grow apart from one another at the thought.

"Whoever did this didn't want Petra to tell you what she'd discovered," Jayden said.

"Maybe it was Gwen—" Celeste began.

"Let's not go down that road," I interrupted, to everyone's surprise. "We've been there before. Until we find out more, I want us united. That means all of us."

"Agreed," Luke said, giving Gwen's hand a squeeze.

"But how exactly do we find out more?" Celeste protested. "Petra's gone. We'll never know what she knew."

"Maybe not," I said. "But I'm searching every page of the Book of Shadows for…anything useful."

Guilt burned inside me, but I'd already decided: I would not tell them about the prophecy. Petra had asked me to meet her alone. Just like Delfina, she'd wanted to keep her knowledge a secret. It was a secret she died for. The less the others knew, the better. I just wasn't sure if I was protecting them or myself.

Perfect. I was a high priestess who didn't trust her own coven.

"All right," I said, changing the subject. "Enough business. We're gathered here to remember Petra."

Like the funeral, the rites of death would be a miserable affair, all mournful chants and tearful remembrances. I felt us all brace for the weight of it.

I sighed, searching for strength. "Today we honor Petra Sarich, our departed sister. She was?—"

My words were cut short by a muffled pop .

We all turned to Jayden, who held a freshly opened bottle of champagne, a few bubbles trailing down its glassy surface.

"Champagne?" I said. "You brought champagne to the rites of death?"

Jayden's devilish smile seemed to hide his pain, if only briefly. "Why yes, it seems I did."

"You can't be serious."

"That's just it, Val. I think we've all been entirely too serious," he replied. "Our girl Petra dies, and we hold some stuffy grief ceremony? Does that sound even a little bit like something she would have wanted?"

"She would hate this," Celeste agreed, "All the tears and, like, feelings."

"Exactly!" Jayden waved the champagne bottle in her direction with a flourish. "If we're gonna honor her, let's do it right. We owe her that."

He had a point. Petra would have never approved of this sobfest. And as I looked at the tense, weary faces of my coven, it was painfully clear that what they needed more than anything was a morale boost.

I shot him a quick, appreciative smile, and though my heart was far from in it, I said, "You know what? You're right. Besides, we're witches . What's the point of all this power if we can't have any fun?"

"Then we party for Petra," Jayden declared, raising the champagne bottle above his head.

The night unraveled as the sun set. It was supposed to be just us, our coven celebrating the life of a sister. Our mistake was believing Celeste could keep a secret. One text to her latest crush and the Mundanes began to trickle in like the cemetery was the hottest new nightspot. Mundane guys arrived in search of Celeste, and girls followed not far behind. The Mundane girls came in packs of swinging ponytails, the chemical scent of their perfume hanging in the air. Jayden and I herded the crowd away from the grave site. They followed us happily and began to congregate around the stone fountain that divided the cemetery's broad main road. Someone fired up portable speakers and music pulsed through the night air.

"At least we won't be dancing on Petra's grave," I said to him.

"She'd probably love it if we did."

Jayden may have come to party, but he'd dressed for mourning. He wore a long black jacket, the collar turned up as if against a chill wind. A delicate cluster of white flowers was pinned to his lapel.

"Elderflower," I said aloud, suddenly remembering the day he'd shown up at Petra's house with a thermos of elderflower tea.

"It's a healing herb, you know," he said, the mirth draining from his face. "All those mornings Petra and I spent drinking that tea, we were just hanging out, but it felt therapeutic somehow, like the tea and the company were good for my soul. I didn't really think about it at the time. Now it keeps me awake at night."

"What do you mean?" I said, worried by the way his eyes grew distant.

He lowered his gaze. "I'm a strong witch, skilled in potions. I've perfected more beauty remedies and love tonics than I can count. But I've never practiced healing magic. I never bothered to learn the one thing that might actually help the people I—" His voice broke. "Maybe I could have saved her if I'd known the right formula. If I'd gotten to her in time. Maybe she'd still be here."

"Jayden," I said softly. "You couldn't have known. Don't be so hard on yourself."

"Listen to me, Val," he said, his expression steely. "It's too late for her. But next time, I'll be ready. I promise you that."

I'd never heard him speak so seriously. "All right," I replied. "And Jayden, if you want to talk more?—"

"I can't. Not tonight. Maybe not ever." He took a long swig from the champagne bottle. "Besides, I thought we were celebrating."

I grabbed his jacket sleeve. There was something I had to do. Something I'd been dreading.

"I'm gonna ask you a question. We'll get it out of the way, and then you're gonna go enjoy the party, okay?"

"Uh, okay."

"Where were you the night Petra died?"

"Alone," he replied. "Sorry, no airtight alibi. Does that make me a person of interest? I mean, I am pretty interesting."

I shook my head. "Thanks, Jayden."

Tipping the champagne bottle at me with unconvincing revelry, he disappeared into the throng of partiers. The pop song on the speaker was replaced by an edgy techno beat. Mundanes passed around six-packs of beer swiped from their parents' refrigerators. People started to form a makeshift dance floor around the paved surface of the fountain.

I approached Max next with the same unpleasant question.

"It's cool. I get why you have to ask." His voice was warm and easy, but the muscles in his neck held an uncharacteristic tension. "I wasn't up to much. Celeste and I saw a some dumb rom-com at the multiplex."

Contrived romance and buttered popcorn definitely fit Max's MO. But a moment later, I found Celeste, and doubt began to spring like weeds in my mind.

"I was shopping on Main Street." She sat on the fountain's edge, her ankles crossed, her eyes on a group of boys in the distance.

"Alone?"

"Uh-huh."

"All night?" I asked. "You didn't do anything else?"

"No." She sighed as if bored with my questions. "I'm a slow shopper. I can be pretty hard to size. I have a long torso." One of the guys she'd been watching motioned for her to join them, and she stood up to leave. "Can I go now? I thought tonight was supposed to be fun."

Without waiting for a reply, she walked away, her shiny black heels digging into the gravel path. The ring of admiring boys closed around her, and I found myself outside of it, my heart racing like the feverish beat of the music. Celeste hadn't mentioned Max or the multiplex. Had she forgotten what she was doing the night her friend died?

Or was one of them lying?

The weight of an arm around my shoulder tore me from my thoughts. Thomas Fitzgerald smelled of cheap beer and cheaper cologne. He stood closer than I would have liked.

"Lis-s-ten, Valeria," he slurred. "I wanted to give you my condolences. You let me know if there's anything I can do."

"You can start by backing up like three feet," I replied, shrugging his large arm away.

He didn't move. Something cruel lit up in his red-rimmed eyes. "Yeah," he said. "I was really sorry to hear about Petra. A young life cut short like that. Think of all the things she never got to do. I mean, she was a solid eight. I totally would've banged her. Now she'll never have that opportunity. It's tragic."

Revulsion rose in me. I longed to strike him, to topple him into the grass. Sunfire pounded in my chest. Suddenly, Luke was stepping between us, Gwen behind him, her dark eyes wide and alert.

"Fitzgerald," Luke said in a low voice. "Move along."

Thomas raised an eyebrow. "You gonna make me?"

This is what he wanted, I realized. A fight. A win.

"I don't pick fights with"—Luke stopped, and I could see the word Mundanes on his lips—"people like you."

"You just don't wanna get your ass kicked in front of your new girl." Thomas's gaze drifted to Gwen.

Her eyes seemed to deepen with fear. Something bad was about to happen. The certainty of it gripped me tight, making my heart quicken. Thomas drained his beer bottle as he looked her up and down.

"You know, Gwen, I like the new look. You're actually kinda hot now. I mean, if you squint hard enough." He leaned into her conspiratorially, his lips on her ear. "How about a dance? Let's make Nichols jealous."

He tugged her toward him, and she staggered forward under his strength, but she regained her footing quickly and wrenched herself away. Something clicked inside her, and the look of fear on Gwen's face was replaced with anger. The change was immediate and barely perceptible.

"Don't touch me," she said.

It was not a plea. It was a warning. But Thomas couldn't tell the difference.

"Come on." He laughed. "Don't be such a prude."

Around us, people had stopped dancing. They stood, watching the scene unfold as if staring at an accident on the side of the highway. Thomas reached for her, and then he was on the ground.

Luke stood over him, one fist raised, ready to hit him again. But Thomas shot up faster than expected. He was bigger than Luke, heavier, and he struck Luke with the full force of his weight. Luke staggered backward, a red gash above one eye. Thomas raised the beer bottle in his other hand, ready to bring it down on Luke's face.

Gwen's eyes went wide, not with panic but with surprise as she understood what she was about to do.

"Stop." As soon as Gwen said the word, Thomas froze, the bottle still raised above his head.

Everything seemed to go quiet, the music the bubbling fountain momentarily drowned out by the magnitude of what was happening. Gwen stood in the center of a motionless throng as Thomas Fitzgerald submitted to her command.

"Put the bottle down," she told him, and he obeyed. "You like to make other people feel afraid, don't you, Thomas?"

His eyes were large, glassy pools. He nodded slowly.

"Now I'm going to make you afraid." She cocked her head to one side, considering. "Think about all the times you hurt people—the times you messed with someone smaller and weaker than you just because you could. Can you do that for me?"

He nodded again, and his face crumpled into an expression of pain as if he'd just relived a string of horrible memories all at once.

"Imagine what those people must have felt. Try to feel their hurt, their panic."

A low moan escaped his lips. His shoulders trembled.

"Hey, Fitzgerald, get a hold of yourself!" somebody cried in protest. A few kids giggled, but there was a nervous edge to their laughter. Thomas ignored them all. His eyes were lost in the blackness of Gwen's.

"Are you afraid now?" she asked.

"Yes," he replied, his voice barely above a whisper.

"Good." Gwen pointed at the ground. "Now kneel."

Her voice was even, but her chest rose and fell rapidly. Her outstretched finger quivered. Thomas's face flushed. His blank eyes filled with tears, yet he still obeyed, his knees digging into the rocky ground.

My skin crawled as the words from the Book of Shadows flashed in my mind. Some can control the Mundanes and make them obey their will. This was malevolent magic.

"Say you're sorry."

"I'm sorry—I'm so sorry—please—" Thomas wept out his apology.

"No tears, Thomas. You should smile," Gwen said, her voice flat. "You'd be a lot prettier if you smiled."

Thomas's lips stretched slowly upward, the terror in his eyes in sick contrast with the grin he now wore.

My mind reeled. If Gwen could do this, what else was she capable of? What else had she done? Her eyes met mine over Thomas's whimpering form, and I knew she saw the fragile trust between us crumble beneath the weight of this new revelation. She shook her head in a silent plea for understanding, but she was still holding Thomas under her spell. I was afraid she wasn't through with him. Afraid of what she would say next.

I took a breath, shut my eyes, and thought of rain.

The drops began to fall immediately. They weren't torrential like Gwen's storm, but they were enough. She began to tremble, her concentration wavering. Then Luke was behind her, rainwater mixing with the blood on his temple. He put his arms around her, whispering gentle words. Her grip on Thomas's mind broke, and she collapsed into Luke's arms as her obsidian eyes rolled back.

Thomas blinked and rubbed his face with shaky hands. Gwen's head lay heavily on Luke's shoulder. Around them, the party dispersed beneath a shower of rain.