Slayer(59)

“What do you do to Bradford?”

She shrugs. “He’s like an old teddy bear. He only asks me to do things that matter and he always thanks me, so I don’t mind. Though I do occasionally switch out his mustache gel for toothpaste. He smells extra minty-fresh those days.”

“And Mom?”

Artemis’s eyes lose their sparkle. “Nothing.” She hands me the journal, pulling her knees up and resting her chin on them. “Nina, I know you’re jealous. That I work with Mom. That I always know where she goes and what she does. But it doesn’t make us closer. If anything, it makes us even less like mother and daughter. She watches me so carefully, and she’s so strict. There are times when I’m jealous of you. Puttering around in your clinic, helping everyone.”

“But I don’t! Not really. Anyone can do what I do in there. You’re going to help so many more people.”

She turns so her cheek rests on her knee and she’s looking at me. “You help people just by being you. You help me. Watchers all live with one foot in the darkness, but you . . . you always manage to bring the light. If I’ve been hard on you the last couple of days, it’s because—I don’t want you to lose that.”

I want to tell her everything I’ve been feeling. And this is my chance. “Artemis, I—”

“It’s okay.” She shakes her head, cutting me off. My heart sinks. She doesn’t want to talk about me being a Slayer. It helps that I know at least part of why. But it means I still can’t be honest with her.

She continues. “I can protect you from this darkness. Even if I’m not a real Watcher. If there even is such a thing as a real Watcher now. I’ve got you.” She pokes at the book. “What else does the diary say?” Her abrupt subject change is not lost on me. But if Artemis needs to not talk about things, I’ll respect that. She’s helped me so much over the years. I’m still learning how to do the same for her.

“A lot of training procedure.” I flip through pages of dietary schedules, tests, and techniques. I skip to the end, wondering how this particular Potential ended up. What did she get assigned to do? Did she become one of our accountants? A cook? Special ops? It took a lot of different jobs to keep us running when we were at full capacity. I wonder if any of the Slayers ever ended up as medics. Maybe I would have had something in common with one.

“Wait.” I point to one of the last entries. “She did become the Slayer. And she had a baby. And then—oh, sad. She got killed by vampires. She was only Slayer for a few months. It looks like Bradford Smythe took the baby in.” The name of the baby is at the end of the book.

“Helen,” Artemis and I both read at the same time.

Helen. Our mother.

How many times can my past break and reform itself? Our mother wasn’t born to be a Watcher. She was adopted into it. She was the daughter of a Slayer. A woman she never knew. A woman who died for a calling I now have. The same calling that killed my father.

I should be stunned that she would keep something so huge from us, but that’s the least surprising part of this. My mother has been an opaque mystery to me for so long now. But this revelation answers one thing.

“No wonder Mom hates Slayers so much,” I whisper. “It goes way beyond Buffy. Artemis, do you—do you think she hates that I am a Slayer, or does she hate me for being a Slayer?”

“Mom doesn’t hate you.”

“She’s pushed me away all these years! She lied to everyone about me being a Potential. And gods, I get it now. It’s not just about Dad. It’s her whole life. I represent everything that’s ever hurt her.” I feel burdened by my mother’s pain, irrationally angry with her for having a tragic history. I didn’t ask for any of this. I don’t want to feel sorry for her. I won’t.

“The whole Slayer thing, it’s not fair,” Artemis says. I think she’s talking about our mom, until she continues. “Why would it even happen to you? It makes no sense. I don’t get it. It never should have been you.”

“Who should it have been, then?” I ask, feeling defensive. I’m conflicted about being a Slayer, sure, but it’s a mystical event. If I was Chosen, it’s because I was supposed to be.

Artemis surprises me. “No one,” she says, her voice harsh. “No one. They never should have forced this on anyone. Not since the very first Slayer. A bunch of weak, arrogant men decided what was best and saddled all the rest of us with the consequences.” Artemis grabs the diary, slams it shut, and throws it in the corner of the room.

She climbs back on her bed. “Come on. I just want to watch a dumb movie and not think about anything.”

Artemis is done with the conversation. And now that I’m seeing what a toll this life has taken on her, I’m determined to protect her, instead. So we put on a rom-com, and I paint her fingernails crimson, my hands steady, the paint perfect. She does mine, but her fingers tremble and leave my cuticles looking as bloody as they were after the pit.

? ? ?

I startle awake, bleary-headed and confused. Dawn is creeping soft and inevitable across the horizon. After our movie, we both passed out early. My nonsleeping nights finally caught up to me with a vengeance.

I lie silently in bed, thinking about what we learned. Our mother was the daughter of a Slayer. If she hadn’t been, she never would have met the Watchers. Never become one. Never met our father. We wouldn’t be Watchers. But we also wouldn’t even exist.