Spellcaster

  All Mateo said was, “I’m with you.”

  All day, Nadia’s mind was on the night’s dive. Her body, unfortunately, was stuck in school, and every class seemed to drag on and on forever. A counseling session with Faye Walsh seemed likely to bore her to actual, literal death, until Nadia came up with the idea of telling her that she was working with Verlaine on digitizing the back issues of the Lightning Rod—that was an extracurricular project, right? Apparently it counted, at least enough to get Ms. Walsh off her back for the moment.

  Her head still in the clouds—thinking of what to wear, when to go, what to tell her father—she drifted down the hallway toward her last class, when suddenly Elizabeth stepped directly in front of her.

  Nadia stopped short. Elizabeth regarded her without malice or curiosity. With her chestnut curls long and loose and her unfashionable airy dress, she ought to have looked unkempt, even tacky. Instead, there was an incredible stillness to her. Her beauty was so precise that it might have been plotted on a sketch pad with compass and protractor, every measurement ideal and yet impersonal. Looking at Elizabeth was like looking at a statue of some ancient goddess that could smite you at a glance.

  “Your mother is gone,” Elizabeth said.

  How did she know that? Nadia struggled for words. “That’s—none of your business.”

  Elizabeth cocked her head. “Your father forgot to mention my visit, didn’t he?”

  Wait—Elizabeth was in my house? Nadia felt her arms tightening around her books, as if using them to shield her heart.

  “People often forget where I’ve been,” Elizabeth continued. “I prefer it that way. Once they’re aware of me—of what I can do—it’s harder. But I could make you forget about me. Forget my name. Forget your own name, if I chose.”

  Every bad thought she’d had about Elizabeth was true. Nadia remembered Mateo—the danger he was in because of the curse, how vulnerable he was to Elizabeth’s manipulation—and that plus her fear for her dad seized her, turning her fear to rage. “Tell me what you’re doing to this town. What are you after? What do you want?”

  “Nothing I haven’t earned.”

  “Then what are you doing to Mateo? You’re friends. You have to care about him, at least a little. Why haven’t you told him about the curse? Why aren’t you protecting him from it?”

  To her surprise, Elizabeth smiled. The expression was fond, in a patronizing way—like how she might look at a puppy before she petted its head. “You’re very young. You don’t have your full power yet, and you have no teacher to guide you. So you’ll never be a real witch. You and I both know that. So why are you prying into my life? And Mateo belongs to me in ways you could never even begin to understand.”

  “He’s not your property,” Nadia shot back.

  “Oh, but he is. You know I can make people forget, Nadia. I can also make people remember. If I wish it, Mateo will ‘remember’ that he’s in love with me. That he always has been. He’d be so intensely in love with me that he’d do anything I asked, as quickly as a snap of my fingers.” Elizabeth’s eyes crinkled slightly at the corners, like someone remembering a good joke. “They say it’s better to have loved and lost than to have never loved at all. But you’ve loved and lost, haven’t you? You know how it hurts. Are you going to keep investing all that emotion in Mateo, knowing I can separate you two forever at any moment I please?”

  Loved and lost. Nadia had gone out with guys, had cared about a few, but she’d never truly fallen for someone—not the way she sensed she could fall for Mateo. The only love she’d lost was her mother’s love.

  And that loss had gutted her beyond anything else Nadia had ever experienced or imagined. It still hurt so badly, every single day—

  The thought of setting herself up for that kind of pain again made Nadia feel faint. She put one hand out to steady herself against the cinder-block wall of the school. Elizabeth’s chin lifted—she’d seen Nadia’s weakness, and Nadia hated herself for it.

  Elizabeth said only, “For your own sake, you should move on. From me, from this town. Keep your family safe. Haven’t you been through enough?”

  Then she simply walked away.

  Would that warning be sufficient?

  Elizabeth thought so. She doubted a slip of a girl like Nadia Caldani represented any real danger in the first place; any complications from Nadia’s crush on Mateo would be minor and easily corrected with spells of forgetting or compulsion. Nadia would never tell Mateo about magic, or therefore about Elizabeth’s own witchcraft—someone so earnestly self-righteous would never break one of the First Laws.

  And yet Elizabeth had to think of another besides herself.

  Were Nadia to turn her avid curiosity away from Elizabeth and onto the magic she must, by now, have sensed beneath the chemistry lab—

  No, that would not do.

  Quickly Elizabeth cast a simple spell to shield the chemistry lab better. No magic on earth was capable of shielding that much power for very long, but she only needed another few weeks now.

  I protect you, she thought to the last One she would ever love. I stand between you and all who would oppose you, weak or mighty.

  The spell shimmered out across the school, settling deep within the earth, where it could do the most good.

  Now, to cover her tracks. Briefly Elizabeth considered having Nadia forget everything about her. It would be cleaner—but probably short-lived. If Nadia had figured out this much already, she’d probably manage to figure out that Elizabeth was a witch again—and again—and again. Repeated confrontations: What a bore.

  Besides, Nadia’s knowledge was no more threat than Nadia herself, now that the Chamber was protected. Elizabeth needed only to ensure that would continue.

  So she sent out a spell of forgetting, highly targeted, highly specific—and sufficient to make sure Nadia Caldani could do nothing to interfere with Elizabeth’s plans, in even the slightest way.

  Nadia stopped in her tracks, books in her arms. Did I forget something?

  She’d been freaking out about Elizabeth facing her down that way—so much that apparently she’d lost track of something else. And it was important, too. Did it have to do with chemistry class, maybe?

  I bet there’s an assignment I forgot to write down, she thought, and sighed. She’d have to ask Mateo about it later.

  The neighbors looked at Mateo warily when he asked to borrow the boat, but then, that was how they always looked at him. As soon as they said yes, he texted Nadia: Meet me at sunset at the boathouse. Is Verlaine coming?

  I didn’t tell her about it, Nadia replied, and Mateo felt slightly relieved. It wasn’t that he didn’t like Verlaine—he kind of did, which surprised him, since as long as he could remember, she’d been the only kid more outcast than he was in Captive’s Sound. But whatever they found in the ocean—if it explained more about who Elizabeth really was, what she was keeping from him—then he wanted to talk about that with Nadia, alone.

  Already he felt like he could tell Nadia everything.

  What was it about someone that made you know, just know, your secrets were safe with them? Mateo had come to know Nadia first in his dreams, and in those dreams he’d felt—protectiveness, trust, even something that might be love. But those had been only nightmare visions, the emotions experienced there as fleeting as sleep. What was stirring between him and Nadia now—that was real. It could endure. Could he trust that feeling, and trust her?

  Walking out to the water that evening made him shiver. Not from the chill in the air—though it was coming, fall already threatening to turn into winter with September not even quite over—but from the view, the look at his hometown that revealed all the evil he’d always sensed but never before seen.

  Being a Steadfast meant more than strengthening Nadia’s powers. It meant facing the world for what it really was—filled with magic, more dangerous and far stranger than anyone could ever guess.

  Even during the daytime, the sky overhead was different than
it should have been. Dingier. Lower. When he looked at it, Mateo had the uncanny sense that it was looking back. At first he thought he could even see the reflection of that gloom on the waters, but then he realized they were poisoned in the exact same way. Staring at the ocean, the waves seemed not blue but a slick, iridescent black, as if in the aftermath of an oil spill.

  As the sun lowered enough to touch the eerie surface of the ocean, Nadia appeared at the boathouse. Her figure was all but obscured by the heavy fleece top and sweatpants she wore.

  It wasn’t like Mateo hadn’t noticed before then that Nadia had an incredible body. He was a guy. There was no chance he’d miss that. But he hadn’t realized he was already in the habit of checking Nadia out every single time he saw her. Maybe he should think about that some more later, he decided as he straightened up. They had a job to do.

  “You got a boat?” she said. “Good work.”

  “No big deal. Pretty much half the population of Captive’s Sound has a boat.”

  “How come you guys don’t? No time, with the restaurant?”

  Mateo hesitated. “We had one. Mom took it when she—when she drowned herself. Dad never bought another.” He’d never known what became of the boat. Had it washed up, been found and disposed of by some neighbor quick to burn something that had touched the Cabot curse? Or did it drift out to sea? It might still be there, floating in the middle of the ocean, empty and alone.

  Nadia’s hand briefly rested on his shoulder. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to bring that up. I should’ve thought.”

  “You didn’t know.” He took a deep breath. “Come on. Let’s get going.”

  “Hey, do we have an assignment in chemistry?”

  “No homework I can remember. Why?”

  “Huh. No reason.”

  The motor gunned on the first yank, and soon they were skimming across the shining black water. Going out at dark like this was risky, he knew, but they couldn’t be seen; diving was way more dangerous than boating, and if anybody caught them at it, they’d get hauled back in.

  Besides, he figured—they were heading straight for the lighthouse.

  It still ran most nights, its golden beam sweeping around the water in wide circles. As the sky overhead darkened, the lighthouse turned on; the first time the beam swept over their boat, it was as if they momentarily dissolved in brilliance.

  “Will the lighthouse keeper see us?” Nadia shouted over the roar of the engine. Her black hair streamed behind her in the wind.

  Mateo shook his head. “It’s automated. We’re safe.”

  Then his eyes widened, and he didn’t feel safe anymore.

  Because once again he saw the magic burning bright beneath the water.

  Finally the sky was dark enough for Mateo to take it in as he had before. The steady, greenish glow was a few dozen feet from the lighthouse. The churning surface of the waves, this close, meant that the illuminated water leaped and moved as though it were alive somehow, twisting and writhing as if to enclose them.

  He cut the motor. Their boat continued forward propelled only by momentum. Nadia frowned at him. “Why are we stopping?”

  “We’re almost there. Can you not see it?”

  “No. Tell me.”

  Mateo pointed at the heart of it, only a few feet away now. The light seemed to form a wreath around their boat, as if they were caught in its net. “Right there. That’s where I need to dive.”

  “You mean, where I need to dive.”

  He turned toward her, startled. “Nadia, are you crazy? I can see it. You can’t. Being in the ocean—it’s not like being in a pool, you know.”

  “But it’s not that different from being in Lake Michigan,” she insisted. “I’m a good swimmer. Even did Red Cross lifeguard training.”

  She had him there; Mateo had never been a great swimmer, and he’d given it up altogether after Mom’s death. But he said, “I should still be able to dive for it if I can see it.”

  Already she was peeling off her sweatshirt; Nadia gasped softly, probably from the cold air hitting her skin. Next came the thermal undershirt, and then he could see the slim black one-piece she wore beneath. It was a lifeguard’s suit, or a competitive swimmer’s, not the usual brightly colored bikini girls wore to show off on the sand. And yet something about the purposeful way she moved, the simple grace of her, captivated him more than bare skin ever had.

  Oblivious to his distraction, Nadia said, “Mateo, whatever is down there is powerful magic. There may be enchantments protecting it. Nobody but a witch would be able to do this. Besides—you’re my Steadfast. You make me stronger. That’s why I need you up here.”

  “I don’t like it,” he said, but if what she said was true—he was stuck with it. He tossed the anchor over the side; cold water splashed his arms as the chain snaked down behind it. Fifteen feet deep, maybe a little more: That wasn’t too bad. “Okay. Just—work as fast as possible.”

  “Trust me, I intend to.” Nadia had kicked off her sweatpants and shoes, too; she wore only the swimsuit and hugged herself as she looked over the edge. Mateo tried not to stare, at least not to drool like that jerk Jeremy Prasad would, but it was hard not to—she was so close to him, close enough to touch.

  For a moment he found himself remembering last summer at the beach, and the girl who’d hooked up with him on a dare. But now, in his mind, he imagined that this time it was Nadia lying on the towel with him beneath the pier, her fingers tangled in his hair as he ran one hand along her bare leg—

  Jesus, she’s about to do something seriously dangerous, could you concentrate for a second? Mateo handed her the wrist flashlight he’d brought for his own use. “Here. And if you run into trouble, flick the light off and on really fast, okay?”

  “Good idea.” Nadia slipped it on, tested the switch, and took a deep breath. “Point to where you think it is—exactly where.”

  He leaned next to her, so that they were shoulder to shoulder, their foreheads touching. Nadia took one sharp breath that made the boat seem to rock and bob even more strongly beneath them. Lifting her hand with his, he made it so that their fingers pointed together to the core of the greenish fire. “Right there.”

  “I’ve got it.”

  Nadia turned to him as she spoke, and for one moment they remained like that—face-to-face, only inches apart.

  Then she said, “Wish me luck.”

  Before he could do that, or say anything else, Nadia gulped in a breath and went over the edge, diving into the chilly sound without hesitating. The boat rocked beneath him.

  And then—only then—did Mateo remember the dream of her floating overhead, writhed in the murk, her hair flowing around her. He’d thought she was suspended in midair, amid the fog.

  But what if the dream had showed her underwater?

  The cold stabbed into Nadia through every inch of her skin, and it took all her will not to open her mouth and gasp water into her lungs. She slapped on the wrist light, pointing the beam ahead of her—and thanks to Mateo’s guidance, she saw it almost immediately. In a nest of seaweed lay a chest, half-dissolved by time and tide, its ancient boards warped free of the metal framework. A crab scuttled by in the murk, the light glinting off its shell.

  With a few strong kicks, Nadia propelled herself toward it. With any luck she could grab whatever was in the chest right away and get back to the surface within seconds. Then she could put on her clothes, dry her hair, and be warm again—be ready to explore this thing—

  Water stinging her eyes—ugh, she should have brought goggles, but what a time to think of it—Nadia reached the trunk. She couldn’t pry the lid up, but no need: The side of the trunk fell away even as she touched it, and a crab scuttled out. Nadia hoped for no more crabs but put her hand in half expecting to be pinched.

  Instead, she pulled out—yes!—a book. A Book of Shadows.

  It was huge—so big she could hardly wrap her hand around it. Despite its centuries of immersion in water, the book remained intact; when s
he opened it, Nadia suspected, the pages would remain dry.

  No charms showed themselves; no more spellwork was required. And only one breath! Triumphantly, Nadia began kicking toward the surface—only to feel seaweed winding around her legs.

  Tight.

  So tight it was like being tied down.

  Nadia kicked, then thrashed, but the seaweed only increased its hold.

  The Book of Shadows had been protected after all—and by magic she didn’t know how to break.

  11

  FIRST, MATEO FELT IT—A QUIVER ALL AROUND HIM, as if the air itself were twisting away. At that moment, the unearthly glow beneath the water changed; it brightened sharply, then dimmed like someone had covered it. The darkness around them seemed almost complete, as if it were the dead of night instead of just after sunset. Without understanding how he knew, Mateo knew that a boundary had been crossed.

  Again he thought of Nadia in his dream, floating, frightened, and trapped—

  —and he had to trust the dream. It might be part of his curse, but it was also his only chance of keeping Nadia safe.

  He was stripping off his sweater even before he saw the tiny beam of the flashlight go on, off, on, off. Nadia was in danger, and he had to get to her, now.

  Mateo dove in. The biting cold that surrounded him, sliced into him, was less important than what he saw. Nadia struggled underwater, one arm wrapped around an enormous book, the other clawing at the seaweed tangling around her ankles. But even as she would pull one tendril loose, two more would writhe along her foot and hold her even faster. Her eyes were wide and desperate; she had been down for a while now. Way too long.

  Quickly he broke for the surface again, took in the largest mouthful of air he could hold, and plunged in. Mateo kicked toward her, caught her shoulders in his hands. The panic in Nadia’s eyes was terrible to see. He pressed his mouth to hers, opening it—then blew the air into her lungs, giving Nadia precious oxygen. As he did, he felt Nadia realize what he was doing and inhale deeply; for a moment they remained tangled like that: two people, one breath.