17

I stood motionless, staring across the kitchen, past the jagged, dark chasm in the floor, upon which a marble island had once

stood, at Este.

Eyes closed, neck bloody, shirt drenched crimson, she was pinned to the opposite wall at the far end of the kitchen by a massive

splinter of wood. Her long dark hair was tangled around the splinter as if she'd been trying to dodge it when it struck her.

I opened my mouth, but nothing came out. Silently I screamed her name, silently I screamed, My God, what have I done, what have I done ?

I'd demolished the kitchen. There was no way across the chasm to my best friend; it cleaved the room from wall to wall and

had taken most of the appliances, stepladders, and pots with it.

I whirled, racing for the back door, leapt out, dashed down the courtyard—holy hell, what had I done to the courtyard ?

No time to look. At the far end of the kitchen, I grabbed an outdoor end table, smashed the window, frantically knocked out

jagged pieces of glass, and hoisted myself over the ledge.

I was sobbing by the time I reached her. "Este! Este! Este!" I cried brokenly.

Slowly, she opened her eyes and smiled weakly. "Oh, bloody hell, Zo, you ruined the kitchen. It was my favorite room."

I gaped. "You're joking ?"

"Get this damned splinter out."

I eyed the massive spike of wood lodged deep in the wall. "How?" I asked blankly. I wasn't that strong.

" Will it out. After that gigantic tantrum you just threw, it should prove no problem for you. And here I was, thinking I should

have stayed up and begun training you. Clearly, you don't need my help."

"My God, Este, are you okay? You're bleeding everywhere!"

"I'm only stuck by my hair, you crazy, badass witch." She smiled again, very faintly. Her gaze was wary, studying me carefully.

"But you're bleeding all over—"

"Grazed my neck. Unpin me, for fuck's sake!"

I closed my eyes, seeking a source of energy but this time delicately, beguiling aid. Beyond the Midnight Garden stretched

a lush field of wheat. I drew carefully, with love, summoning only minute atoms from individual shafts and, after a moment,

opened my eyes to watch, dumbfounded, as the splinter gently levitated back, withdrawing from the plaster before crashing

to the floor.

As Este dragged her hair free of the hole and scraped it over her shoulder, I grabbed her and hugged her fiercely. "Oh, Este,

I'm so sorry! I never meant to hurt you! I swear I didn't!"

We clung to each other for a long moment then she drew back and said, "Believe me, babe, I know that. If you'd meant to, I'd

be dead. If you didn't love me, if beneath your love you'd held a single iota of a deadly thought, that stake would have gone

straight through my throat." Her gaze darkened with fear. "Zo, I don't know how you did that. You shouldn't have been able

to. I thought you'd been awakened when your mom died but still had six more stages to go through, carefully and with guidance.

But someone has forced you through all the stages. If I'd known that, I'd never have gone to bed. I'd have spent every minute teaching you to not do something like what you just did. Babe, you're fully empowered, unpledged and completely untrained, and I have no bloody clue what they think they're doing but you're insanely dangerous in the state you're in."

"You mean bad," I said woodenly.

"I mean untrained. Unpledged. If you'd killed me—" She broke off, compressing her lips.

"What?" I demanded.

Sighing, she said, "You don't come back from that. You can't kill unpledged. It changes you. And to kill someone you love?

Damn, woman. Even the gray would think twice about whether to use you. You'd have carried my death; that kind of thing makes

a witch darker than dark."

"How exactly does it change you?" I demanded. Had I killed the man in the barn or not? Which narrator had been speaking—the instructor

or the liar?

"Just be very, very glad you didn't."

I was sick of nonanswers, but she was bleeding, and I pushed her hair back to see for myself just how "grazed" her neck was.

When I did, I was horrified.

"Este, we have to get you to the hospital!"

"No hospital," she said wearily. "I'm going to teach you how to heal me. With all that terrifying power you have, you can.

That's how you'll make reparation for what you did to this kitchen."

Sighing heavily, I groaned, "It didn't stop at the kitchen."

Her eyes went wide. "What? Where?"

I glanced miserably at the courtyard, tears filling my eyes.

Her gaze followed mine. "Oh, Zo!"

Everything in the courtyard was dead. Each tree, every flower, all the shrubs, blackened and dead. There were no more mighty oaks strung with fairy lights and bottles spinning on jute cords. They'd collapsed to charred piles. There were no planters with lush flowers, no magnolias, no wisteria tumbling down the side of the garage, no bushes, no tufts of decorative grass. It was as if a wildfire had ripped through the garden, destroying everything in its path, and I prayed it stopped there, that I hadn't also destroyed the sacred garden beyond. The charred earth was littered with creatures of the night, and I hoped with all my heart that Rufus was far away, high in the sky, surveying his nocturnal kingdom, not among them.

"I took life," I said brokenly. "Am I damned?"

She hugged me fiercely. "Never think that! You think that, you go there. This was not your fault. It's the fault of whoever awakened you, knowing you had no training. This one is not on you, and don't you dare

carry it!"

I heard a kernel of truth in her words, but it made no difference to my heart. Come dawn, I would bury each of the blackened

skeletons, the bats and the squirrels who'd nested, slumbering; the birds; the snakes tucked into thickets of brush; the voles;

and the cat I'd had no idea lived with us, digging their graves, trying to divine what reparation I might make that could

ever atone for what I'd done.

Had I really killed the man in the barn?

If so, according to Este, it was already too late for me. And, according to her, not only did I need to conceal from the townsfolk

that I may not be a Cameron but also that I may have killed unpledged. Peril, peril everywhere.

I was a witch. I no longer suffered an ounce of a doubt on that score.

And a damned powerful one.

And quite possibly, a very, very bad one. For the briefest of moments, I felt another surge of fury. If only Mom had told me, if everything truly was choice, we could have learned to be good, couldn't we? She was kind, I was kind—surely we could have gone light! There was nothing two people who loved each other couldn't accomplish with conscious choice and discipline.

Swiftly, I locked my fury tightly away. I had no right to strong feelings anymore. The luxury of emotion, like everything

else about my life and my future as a witch, would have to be earned. I would never again slip into such terrible darkness,

I vowed fervently.

If the choice is me or damaging someone else or the world , I pledged fiercely, I will sacrifice myself next time. But there won't be a next time.

Ah, the vows we make with such utter conviction.

I've begun to wonder if the universe uses them to test us.