Ember fisted her hands, impatience carving lines in her forehead. “Why that spot? Who chose it?”
“We all did, I guess.”
“Why?” I asked.
His shoulders drew toward his ears and stayed there. “You’ll think I’m crazy if I tell you.”
“We don’t so far.” Ember’s teeth didn’t part as she spoke, and I couldn’t blame her. Getting information out of this guy was like squeezing wine from a raisin.
“We won’t think you’re crazy. We’re trying to help figure this out.” I walked around to the side of the bed, ready to strangle it out of him if he didn’t hurry up.
Okay, no, I would never actually strangle someone. But Ember might.
“It felt different there. We walked into the woods and headed straight for that spot like it wanted us to do the séance there.”
“That makes sense.” I looked at Ember, who nodded.
“It’s as we suspected.”
“You believe me?” Jason clutched my wrist, startling me. “Tell me you believe me.”
My gaze flicked to his hand, and Chaos growled in my head. “He shouldn’t be touching you.”
Jason’s eyes widened in a look of sheer terror. His grip tightened, his breath coming in short pants as if something…or someone…had reversed the effects of the sedatives.
“Down, boy,” I said to Chaos as I pried Jason’s grip from my arm and stepped away. His expression immediately returned to a vacant stare. “Thank you for talking to us.”
Ember followed me to the door, her face solemn. “You were right,” she said as she pulled the door shut. “The demon drew them there. A witch who didn’t understand magic was in the wrong place at the wrong time, and three people are dead because of it.”
I nodded. “And I highly doubt she had the power to summon Discord.”
“Which means we’re back to square one, with no clue who started this mess.”
“Cinder had a clue.”
Ember looked at me sideways as we paced down the hall.
“She had the sigils in her room,” I said. “It can’t be a coincidence.” We exited the building and climbed into the van.
“I hear you.” Ember started the engine and backed out of her parking space. “But whatever clue she had; she took it with her.”
“Maybe not.” I rubbed my palms on my jeans. “I found her diary under the mattress with the sigils.”
She slammed on the brakes. “And you’re just now telling me about this?”
“I tried to talk to you about it last night, but you shut me down. The page of demon symbols was inside one of my sigil books, and that book was lying next to her diary.”
She looked at me like I’d grown horns. “What did it say?”
I ran my fingers through my hair to make sure I hadn’t. Whew. No horns. “I didn’t read it.”
“Why not? It could have clues to what happened to her. To Mom and Dad.”
I held up my hands. “First off, it has her private thoughts. There might be stuff in there we don’t want to know, and I’m not in the habit of snooping. Second, I was a little distracted by the demon in my head and then the one in the woods. It’s in my desk drawer.”
“If she did summon my brother with his skull, she might have known where mine is.”
I hated to admit it, but it was in everyone’s best interest for us to peruse Cinder’s private thoughts. I sighed. “We’ll read it when we get home.”
CHAPTER NINE
“Oh, hell.” Ember rolled to a stop on South Washington Square, bordering Salem Common, an eight-acre park in the heart of downtown. “Can we not make it from point A to point B without a fiasco?”
She grabbed her phone and pressed it to her ear while I peered out the window at the commotion. People screamed, throwing their arms over their heads and running for cover. A black mass followed a man who darted toward the gazebo, a stray blob freeing itself from the herd to latch onto his neck. He swatted it away, and it hit the ground before rising and rejoining the mass.
“Is that a swarm of fae?” I crawled over the console, into the backseat to retrieve my spell kit. Crap. I never had time to restock it.
“Sure looks like it. Shade is on his way. Can you slow the critters down until they get here?” She pulled off the road and parked in a no-parking zone. Chief Higgins would make the ticket disappear if need be. He owed us that much.
“There is a rift here. I can sense it.”
“No shit, Sherlock.” I balanced the bowl on the back seat and dumped in the ingredients for my newly concocted spell. “Stray fae get through here and there year-round, but I’ve never encountered a swarm that big.”
“I despise the fae.”
“Don’t we all?” Their high-pitched laughs were enough to drive anyone mad, but those teeth… Tiny, razor-sharp daggers filled their mouths, and they loved the taste of human blood. They were the mosquitos of my nightmares.
Ember exited the driver’s side and opened the back door. “No talking to Chaos when the other witches are around. The demon business is between you and me for now. If no one has a hostile takeover planned yet, they will when they find out you performed dark magic.”
