Banishing the Dark (Arcadia Bell #4)(75)

“The Moonchild ritual was just meaningless ceremonial bullshit,” I said. “All they did was invoke this serpentine being into my father. Any magician with half my skills could do it. All my mom did was have sex with my dad while he was possessed by some kind of nocturnal proto-demon creature.”

“Cady . . .”

“Don’t you get it? Priya said all I had to do was figure out what kind of magick my parents used and remove it, but he was wrong. How can I reverse this? I’m a stew of psychotic human and demon DNA.”

Lon didn’t deny it.

Tears burned my eyes. I backhanded the metal box off the console, sending my parents’ cache of money flying, and roared at the pain that shot through my knuckles. When Lon tried to reach for me, I stormed away and headed to the hallway I’d seen in my vision, where my parents first appeared. It branched off to two bedrooms with nothing in them but stripped mattresses. Empty closets. Another empty room with traces of red ochre chalk on the wooden floor. An avocado-green kitchen that looked as if it hadn’t been updated since the 1960s. I strode through it, opening cabinets and drawers, flinging silverware across the peeling countertops. Nothing and more nothing. Not a damn thing but old grease splatters and a door that led to the backyard. I unlocked it and marched outside.

Remembering the diagram my mother had drawn, I strode through dead grass and made my way through scraggly underbrush to a clearing ringed with winter-bare trees.

Here it was. A February moon shone down on the place where they’d made me. I stared up at the dark sky. No magical hot spot or carefully designed ritual space. Just a plain old clearing on some property they’d bought out of convenience, where rich old men hunted wild boars for sport.

I heard Lon’s boots crunching through the brittle grass and sighed as he stopped by my side and stared up at the sky with me.

After a few moments of silence, cold night air sent a shiver through me. I stuck my hands into my pockets. “All of this was for nothing. I spent my entire adult life on the run to protect them, and they didn’t need protecting. And when I finally decide to start living my own life, what do I do? I come here. Of all the places in the country I could choose, I come right back where it all started. How sick is that?”

“Cady—”

“I’ve been running in circles, and I just can’t get away. I send them to the goddamn Æthyr, and she’s still got her nasty claws in me. I feel like a puppet that can’t shake the puppet master. Was I drawn here because she’s still puppeting me? Am I still Sélène?”

Lon was silent for several moments. “You may not feel it now, but you love me. You’re f*cking crazy about me, and you’re crazy about Jupe. So maybe you were drawn here because I needed you and because my boy needed a mother.”

I swiped away tears, unable to respond.

“Or that could just be coincidence,” he said, looking back up at the sky. “Maybe you were drawn here because you’re the only person strong enough to stop Enola.”

“Maybe,” I whispered.

“I’ll tell you one thing I know for certain. When I read that chart she made of your life, I didn’t see a puppet. I saw a girl who shocked her own father in self-defense, who was rebellious and had to be carefully controlled. A girl who was a threat to them, even when she was a child. So despite whatever your mother chose to call you, you’ve never really been Sélène. You’ve always been Cady. Be that girl now. Be yourself. Enola Duval has no power over Arcadia Bell.”

I stared up at him, breathing hard and tamping down chaotic sentiments. “You know, you’re probably my favorite person in the entire world right now,” I said, trying to be lighthearted about what he was making me feel. And oh, the intense emotion that radiated from him when I said that. Strong enough to make me suck in a startled breath. Whatever it was, it cut through my remaining indecision.

Shutting out my surroundings, I yanked up my coat sleeve and stuck my finger in my mouth. Then I swiped saliva across the white-ink tattoo on my inner arm to charge Priya’s homing sigil.

“Priya, come,” I commanded, willing my guardian to appear.

The air fluctuated a few feet in front of me. I backed up and watched a slim, bare-chested figure step out of the night, all silver skin and dark, spiky hair crowned with a halo of black smoke, with shiny black wings folded behind his back. A beautiful sight and a massive relief to see him again, unharmed and whole.

“Mistress!” His black eyes blinked rapidly, as if I were the one who’d materialized in front of him. “I am so happy to see you. So very happy.”

“The feeling is mutual, my friend.”

He pushed back a lock of black hair that had fallen over one eye. “Why did you summon me? You should be using the Kerub’s boy . . .” He trailed off and flicked an unhappy look at Lon before offering him a begrudging nod in greeting. “You shouldn’t be calling me directly,” Priya corrected. “It isn’t safe.”

“I know. But I need you to deliver a message for me. Can you do that?”

“Of course. Anything.”

“First, I want to show you something.”

I willed the transmutation to come, trying my best not to tap into moon power as silver coated my vision and my body began changing. I caught my tail just in time and guided it over the stretchy waistband of my yoga pants—much easier than jeans—letting it coil around my wrist as it grew.