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Not just tea. Bergamot. Lavender. Sage. She smelled dust, and old books, and beeswax, and peppermint, and mugwort, and castile soap, and the thousand other things that together could only be one impossible thing.

Evelyn. Her mother.

···

Henry opened his eyes, and then he saw them.

Old, and young, some beautiful, some withered.

Many of them with faces Henry almost recognized—fair skinned and dark haired, strange and hawkish and lovely, each of them radiating magic like a light bulb under the skin.

He looked out at the sea of faces, features repeating like notes in a song.

He saw a dozen women—this one with Lydia’s eyes, that one her nose, her mouth, her smile.

He saw a young woman he recognized, with red hair and a green dress, smiling like a girl with a secret.

She stood shoulder to shoulder with another woman, older, but glamorous in a way Henry associated with opera singers and movie stars.

And he saw Evelyn, standing over her daughter, tears glowing in her eyes.

“Mum,” Lydia breathed.

Henry reached out and touched her hand. “Can you see them?”

“No, but I…I don’t understand. What’s happening?”

He wished he could explain. He wished he could describe in minute detail the face of every woman standing in this chamber so that when she closed her eyes, she would see them, too, and know that they were there for her.

He wanted her to know that she wasn’t alone, to know it the way he knew it, but the sky was growing dark, and the sun was nearly gone, and so he simply said, “It’s okay. It’s time.”

···

Lydia knelt before the Grimorium Bellum , placed her fingers on the page, and the spell began.

The words flowed from her tongue just as quickly as they had the first time.

The air was ripped from her lungs, and then she was suffocating, the words tumbling out of her but no air coming back in.

She’d known it was coming, and that this time there would be no coven to help ease the burden, but the fear came anyway, cold and mean.

Please, let me live long enough to finish it , she thought.

Just across from her, Lydia’s spectral twin crouched on the chamber floor, seething and churning like black fire.

It was strangely quiet in that space occupied by only the two of them, like sitting in the eye of a storm.

The creature stared into Lydia’s eyes, and for a moment it looked almost mournful, like a friend, begging her to save herself. To save them both.

It doesn’t have to be this way , it seemed to whisper. You can stop this. She felt everything the book did, all its hope and fear, as clearly as if it were her own . Think of all the things we could do together.

Lydia tried not to listen, but it was no use. They were bound together. They were one.

You won’t survive this , the creature whispered. It sounded deeply sad. Lydia saw her own gray eyes staring back at her, set into a face made of nothing but shadow.

Neither will you.

The creature twitched, inky hair twisting around its face. The air around the thing seemed to boil, and as it did, a deep, visceral loathing flooded through Lydia’s skull.

So be it.

There was a rushing sensation, and Lydia felt something like electricity rising up through her spine, a column of pure power and rage burning through her, more than her body could possibly hold. She felt as if her blood had turned molten, like her lungs and skin and bones would turn to ash.

They will , the creature promised.

She could still smell the distinct aroma that could only be Evelyn , as familiar as her voice, or her smile, and for an instant, in spite of everything, she felt safe.

She wondered if that meant she was dying.

It seemed right, somehow. She closed her eyes and tried to conjure her mother’s face—soft, and kind, and proud.

She squeezed her eyes tight and felt as if she could almost see her.

She opened her eyes, and Evelyn was standing before her.

Air flooded her lungs, the crushing weight lifted from her shoulders. Evelyn, pale and lifeless but still somehow Evelyn , stood over Lydia and spoke the words in time with her, and a current of grief and joy rose up within her.

For a moment, Lydia was sure she must be dead already and that her mother had come to take her home.

It was the only thing that made sense, the only way this could be real.

Then she saw the shadow, kneeling across from her on the chamber floor, this dark sister.

She saw it stare up with fear and loathing at Evelyn’s ghostly form, and she understood.

You see her , Lydia thought, her voice carrying through the cord that bound her to the Grimorium Bellum . She had invited it inside her, this instrument of death. She had buried a shard of something evil deep inside her and made them one.

You see her , she thought. And now, so do I.

Lydia watched as more figures came into focus, their voices weaving into hers, as the creature recoiled in horror and confusion.

Most of the women were strangers to her.

They stood shoulder to shoulder, dark hair and milky eyes, speaking as one.

Then she began to see—a stocky matron with hands like her mother’s.

A familiar profile, so much like her own.

A young woman she knew only from photographs, her mother’s favorite aunt, who had died in childbirth long before Lydia was born.

Her gran, solid and upright, one hand held over her heart as she looked into Lydia’s eyes, and chanted, and smiled.

She saw Isadora, tall and regal as a queen.

She saw Kitty, chin up and defiant, fists clenched, and Lydia heard the spell wrench out of her own chest on a ragged sob.

There was fear now, a deep, black terror, but Lydia knew that it did not come from her.

The Grimorium Bellum , sensing the direction of the tide, had begun to pull in on itself, trying to drag itself from her veins, desperate to stop the ritual at all costs, but the struggle was futile.

It was not in its nature to stop a thing once it had begun.

Their chanting lifted higher now, all of them together in one voice.

The book writhed and protested, howling against the current of magic that pulled them all ever closer to the end.

Lydia could hear it, making threats, whispering promises.

It threatened destruction, not just of her body, but her soul, and of the souls of everyone she had ever loved.

It promised her perfect peace, eternal life, and power, power above all else, if only she would stop, Oh please, please stop .

Lydia heard it all and let it pass through her.

Evelyn was kneeling before her now, looking into her eyes as they chanted together.

Lydia could see the end laid out before her, a space in the text the length of a single breath. She ran toward it and leapt.

She spoke the name of the Grimorium Bellum.

This time, the silence came like snowfall.