Spellcaster

  She should have told him he was being ridiculous, or promised to be good and smiled as they went out the door. Instead Nadia wrapped her arms around her father and held him tight. Although he seemed startled, he returned the hug. When she thought she could talk without crying, she said, “I’ll miss you.”

  “Honey, are you sure you’re all right here?”

  “Just—being on my own. It’s weird. You know.”

  “Yeah. I do.” And he would, wouldn’t he? “We can still stay.”

  “No, we can’t!” Cole’s voice was almost a shout—and thank goodness, because it made her smile.

  “Really, I’m good,” Nadia said. “Call me when you get there, okay?”

  “You got it.”

  And with that, Dad and Cole were out the door. Nadia stood at the window watching the car drive off until the taillights had vanished into the dusk.

  “All right!” Gage held up both hands above his head; Mateo slapped them as he came in, pretending a cheer he didn’t feel. “Now we can get started.”

  “Looks like the party’s started already,” Mateo said. There were a couple dozen people there, laughing and talking—including a couple of the Jerk Squad, even Jeremy Prasad, but maybe the fact that they were here early meant they’d clear out early, too.

  “Only now gettin’ good,” Gage promised. “Now, we have certain beverages of the controlled variety. These are available to those who aren’t driving or trying to fry their brains into oblivion, mostly because I am sincerely hoping not to have to clean up any puke later on. Do these categories apply to you?”

  “Yeah. I walked over.” And Mateo didn’t feel the need for oblivion any longer. As crappy as he felt about Verlaine—which was about as bad as it got—he wasn’t running from his problems any longer. He was going to face them.

  And tonight, maybe he could do better than that. Because tonight, he and Nadia—

  —what, exactly? He wasn’t sure. But if they were facing the ultimate danger tomorrow, that meant Mateo wanted to spend his last night as close to Nadia as he could possibly be.

  Can in hand, Mateo wandered onto the porch that faced the sea. A few people were roughhousing down on the sand, but here he was more or less alone. Wind chimes made of blue-green glass sang softly in the breeze.

  Somehow this seemed familiar—but he couldn’t quite place the memory. Surely he hadn’t been to Gage’s aunt’s house before; he would have remembered that. But whenever he had visited this place, or another house that reminded him of this, he’d had a good time. Mateo felt warm and relaxed for the first time in way too long.

  Even as he settled back into the cushions of the swing, though, he heard a soft voice: “Mateo.”

  Nadia looked so beautiful. She wore a soft white dress that outlined every inch of her, and her black hair gleamed in the moonlight. But nothing was as incredible as her eyes as she drank him in. Mateo felt like he could hardly speak. Yet he managed to whisper, “Nadia.”

  “Were you waiting for me?”

  More than he’d even known. “Yeah. I was.”

  Mateo held out one hand, and she took it. As Nadia settled into the swing beside him—her thigh against his, her face so close—he swallowed hard.

  Tonight, he thought as she cuddled closer to him. At least we have tonight.

  Behind her mask—the illusion of Nadia only Mateo would see, the one that would make him weak—Elizabeth relaxed into his embrace, and she smiled.

  21

  DOWN ON THE BEACH, A FIRE PIT FLICKERED, AND A FEW people hung around it—singing along with the music, singing all stupid, voices too high and too low and slightly off-key. He could hear the party going on in the house, everywhere around them, and it didn’t matter. Mateo couldn’t take his eyes off Nadia.

  She curled next to him on the swing, shivering from the cold. Her white dress was too thin for the October night air, sharpened as it was by the ocean so close. Mateo shrugged off his jacket and draped it around her shoulders; as he did, Nadia smiled up at him shyly.

  Déjà vu. That was the name for this feeling—the one that told you how you’d done all this before.

  But they had important things to talk about, things he needed to discuss now before he got drunk just from the sight of her. “You got the file I sent with all the magic I saw in town. I don’t know what most of it means—almost any of it—but at least now you have the info. Do you see a—pattern, anything we can use?”

  Nadia thought about that for a moment, then smiled. “Can we maybe not worry about that right now?”

  This seemed weird to Mateo, but their brief separation had made him want to see her so badly—and maybe he ought to make that clear before they got to anything else—

  “You look amazing,” he said. Then he closed his eyes, feeling like he was getting it all wrong. “I mean—I feel weird even thinking about this when Verlaine’s still—”

  “Shhhh.” Nadia put one finger over his lips, which was a way hotter move than he would have thought. “It’s okay. Tonight is just for us.”

  Mateo stroked one hand through her hair, which was as heavy and soft as he’d dreamed. She closed her eyes like—like it felt good, like even that sent shivers through her, and Mateo’s heart began to pound.

  He trailed two fingers along her belly—her skin was warm through the thin cotton of her dress—and slid his hand around her back, bringing Nadia into his embrace. This was so freaking scary, but why? Nadia was the only girl he’d ever really cared about … the only one he’d ever loved. But maybe that didn’t make it easier. Maybe it made it even harder to believe that he could be with her.

  But he could believe it. To hell with the curse. To hell with Elizabeth and whatever her plans were. He and Nadia had something Elizabeth couldn’t take away.

  Mateo closed his eyes as he leaned closer.

  Against his lips, Nadia whispered, “My Steadfast.”

  “Your Steadfast. Yours completely,” he answered. “Always.” And then he drew her into the kiss.

  Elizabeth kept her eyes open as Mateo kissed her.

  A male Steadfast! It violated every magical law, every principle of the Craft. Even the One Beneath himself should have been unable to accomplish such a feat. And yet Nadia Caldani had done this.

  There is a strangeness to her power, Elizabeth thought. Nadia was not stronger than Elizabeth, but her talents could be turned to uncanny purpose. Perhaps it was this that had made her so significant in Mateo’s visions of the future. This also was the reason that further steps should be taken to make sure Nadia could not interfere with tomorrow night.

  Those steps would be so much easier now that Elizabeth could avail herself of Nadia’s Steadfast.

  Mateo kept kissing her, his hands clutching her against his body, his lips finding her cheeks and her throat. It was almost amusing to feel her physical response—imagine, being carried away by something as silly and primitive as human sex. She hadn’t indulged in so long; no doubt that was why. Elizabeth laughed softly before kissing his mouth again.

  A Steadfast gave by far the most power to the witch she … or he … was bound to. But any witch’s spells would gain strength if cast in the proximity of another’s Steadfast. Elizabeth would keep Mateo by her side from now until her death. Perhaps he would die with her. That had a sort of poetry—dying with the last of the Cabots in her arms.

  “Let’s get out of here,” she whispered, knowing he would hear it in Nadia’s voice, that even now he looked down and saw Nadia’s face. The illusion was only for him—anyone else watching saw her as herself, knew that it was Mateo Perez and Elizabeth Pike in a passionate embrace. But that let her make the illusion even more powerful for him, even more compelling. “You and me.”

  How young he looked, how nervous and hopeful. “Yeah.” Mateo swallowed. “We need to talk about how we can use the info we’ve gotten to go after Elizabeth—”

  “There are other things we could do.” Elizabeth kissed his neck, and knew now he would follow h
er no matter what.

  Okay, Mateo thought. We’re going to go over all of this. Make our final plans against Elizabeth. That’s what we’re really doing here. At least, it’s what we’re doing first. Right?

  Still, something about the way Nadia had kissed him—as if she wanted all of him, body and soul—

  The world might end tomorrow, Mateo reminded himself. Live for tonight.

  His hand tightened around Nadia’s. He’d always thought of her as having such small hands. But her palm was square in his, her fingers so long they seemed to wrap around his wrist entirely.

  “Where will we go?” he whispered. They were halfway down the beach by now; Gage’s party was only a few flickering lights on the horizon behind them.

  She gave him a flirtatious glance over her shoulder. “I know a place.”

  A stray thought wandered in: Why aren’t we going to her house?

  Her father and brother were out of town. Obviously that was their best chance at having privacy as long as they wanted—to talk and plan and—anything else, all night long—

  He swallowed hard.

  But they were walking in exactly the wrong direction to go to Nadia’s home, and besides, if that were where they were headed, she would’ve said so.

  Maybe he should suggest it. “Want to go to your house?”

  “I have a better idea.” Nadia stepped closer to him. Funny—she was a little taller than he’d realized, too. Maybe his feet were sinking into the sand. She kissed him, slow and deep, and for a few moments all his worries were very far away. When at last their lips parted, and he was gasping for breath, Nadia said, “Bind yourself to me.”

  “I’m already bound to you. Steadfast, remember?” He slung his hands around her waist.

  “This is different. Better. It keeps us close no matter what.” She smiled as she added, “Trust me?”

  “Of course.”

  Nadia took his wrists in hers and started whispering some kind of incantation. It was different than any spell he’d seen her cast before, and he felt it immediately—as if unseen cords were wrapping around his hands, tying them together.

  Mateo had assumed “close no matter what” was an emotional thing, not a physical one. This was more like … well, like she’d handcuffed him. “Um, Nadia?”

  He didn’t get a chance to object, though, because now they were no longer alone.

  “What have we here?” Jeremy Prasad had wandered off from the party, too, apparently; he had a bottle in one hand and his usual arrogant sneer on his face. “Wow, Mateo, I knew you didn’t have much luck with girls, but here’s a tip: They like it if you actually take them inside first.”

  Mateo wanted to tell Jeremy to get lost, but more than that, he wanted his hands free, and whatever spell Nadia had cast was really strong. Too strong.

  Nadia gave Jeremy an appraising look and said simply, “You’ll do.”

  Then she held one hand out, and it was—impossible to describe, something blacker than night, insubstantial and swirling like octopus ink in water, lacing through the air almost faster than he could see and piercing Jeremy’s body like so many knives.

  Jeremy’s face froze in an expression of pain and shock—and then he went limp. He fell face-first into the sand, hard. The bottle landed beside him, and beer glugged out, forming a puddle around one of Jeremy’s hands.

  Mateo knew, just by looking at him, that Jeremy was dead.

  He turned to look at Nadia, realizing even as he did so that this wasn’t Nadia. As he watched, horrified, her face and form seemed to melt, like spun sugar dissolving in water. The mask split, peeled off, and washed away, leaving Elizabeth standing there.

  She was no longer half-animal, no longer coated in writhing gold. She was only herself, and yet somehow more terrible than ever before.

  “I would have kept the illusion for a while,” she said, almost apologetic. “You would have enjoyed being with the girl you wanted for a night. I suppose I owed you that much. But I needed to do this. No illusion would have held after you’d seen me take a life.”

  Mateo wanted to vomit. He wanted to spit the taste of her kisses from his mouth. But even what had been done to him paled in comparison to the fact that Jeremy Prasad’s dead body lay only a few feet away. The guy was—he had been a total ass, no question, but he didn’t deserve that. He didn’t deserve to get murdered, to fall where he’d been standing. Now he lay on the beach like so much trash washed up by the tide.

  He knew there was no point in trying to run. Even before she’d bound him to her—Why had he consented to it? Why hadn’t he known then that this wasn’t Nadia’s style, that Nadia would have insisted on making plans first thing?—Elizabeth would have been able to prevent him from getting away. So he said the only thing that mattered. “You have me. So you don’t have to go after Nadia. Leave her alone.”

  Elizabeth shook her head. “It’s much too late for that.” Then she stooped down to pick up a seashell—a wide, flat one with a sharp, undulating edge. “This will work. The cuts needn’t be fine.”

  Mateo watched, horrified, as she went to Jeremy’s body and flipped him over on his back. Jeremy’s face—slack and vacant, sand stuck to the skin—was the most gruesome thing he’d ever seen.

  Or it was until she brought the corner of the seashell to Jeremy’s eyes, and then he couldn’t watch any longer.

  Gage’s party seemed to be in full swing already by the time Nadia arrived. She realized she’d gone slightly overboard; most people were in jeans or cords and sweaters, and she’d put on a black dress with a fairly short skirt. Heels, too. Black played a bigger part in her wardrobe than most people’s in town. Probably that was the Chicago city-dweller side coming out. But being overdressed would be worth it to watch Mateo’s expression change when he saw her looking like this.

  Though of course they were meeting up here primarily to make plans. Everything else came after that.

  But it still wouldn’t hurt to look good.

  She weaved through the crowd of people—couples hanging all over each other, girls trying to get six or seven of them together in one hug for a photo. For a moment she remembered that Verlaine was supposed to be there with her, the first party she’d ever been invited to; the wrongness of what had happened to Verlaine would never stop making Nadia feel slightly sick.

  In need of comfort, or at least someone else who understood, she kept searching for Mateo in the dark. He would hate this kind of scene as much as she did—

  Nadia smiled as she realized that Mateo would be outside waiting for her. It was what she would have done, another way they were alike.

  So she stepped outside onto the porch that wrapped around the house. Below, in the sand, some people were crumpling up newspaper and throwing it into a fire pit, trying to keep a sputtering blaze going. Only a couple of people hung out on the porch itself, and Nadia made her way around back.

  But Mateo wasn’t there. Instead, sitting on a broad wooden swing, looking kind of forlorn, was Gage.

  She ought to say hi, at least. “Hey. Great party.” Hopefully that sounded convincing.

  “I guess.” Gage shrugged. Apparently he wasn’t having a great time.

  “Have you seen Mateo?”

  Gage’s depression seemed to deepen. “Yeah. I saw Mateo.”

  Nadia went to him. “What do you mean? What’s the matter?”

  “Oh. Oh. This is—awkward.” Gage ran one hand over his braids as he sat up straighter. “Um, listen. I don’t usually gossip, right? But better you hear this from me than Kendall Bender.”

  “Hear what?”

  “Mateo—I kinda thought you two were—were maybe—you know. But he hooked up with someone else tonight.”

  It hit her like a slap. That couldn’t be true. It couldn’t.

  Gage leaned over, forearms on his knees, to stare down at the porch. “Thing is, he always said he didn’t like her that way. And I always had a thing for her. Mateo knew that. Yeah, they were best friends—I should’ve f
igured—but still. After all those months he told me to make my move on Elizabeth, to see him getting together with her at my own party—it got to me, I guess.”

  “Wait.” Nadia grabbed Gage by the shoulders, clearly startling him, but she didn’t care. “Are you telling me Mateo left here with Elizabeth Pike?”

  “Yeah.”

  “That’s impossible.”

  “Looked pretty possible from where I was standing.”

  There was no way he would ever have willingly gone with her. Elizabeth had him—whether through a spell or a threat, there was no way to know. But Elizabeth was holding Mateo prisoner. She’d already tried to kill Verlaine. And now—now she had Mateo’s Steadfast power to make her even stronger tomorrow night—

  “Sucks, doesn’t it?” Gage sighed. “But really we should have seen it coming.”

  “Which way did they go? Tell me!”

  “Seriously, don’t go after them. You’ll only feel worse.”

  “Gage, this is important.”

  He couldn’t have guessed what she truly meant by that, but his expression changed slightly, like he finally got that this wasn’t as simple as a party hookup. “I—I’m not sure. Her house, I’d guess.”

  Nadia didn’t even say thank you, just got up and ran.

  Dammit, dammit, why did she pick tonight to wear high heels? Every single step she took on the high, winding coastline road stabbed up through her feet and knees, but Nadia never slowed down. She went up the steps to the main road, wobbled on one heel, and nearly fell—so she stopped only long enough to kick off one shoe, then the other, before taking off running again. Concrete started ripping at her tights, bruising her feet, but it didn’t matter.

  Next Christmas she was asking for a car.

  Mateo’s my Steadfast. Not hers. That means he’ll give my spells more strength than Elizabeth’s. And she won’t be expecting me. That’s all I’ve got going for me. Is that going to be enough?

  It has to be. I’ve already lost Verlaine, already let her down, and I can’t lose Mateo, too—