Page 158 of Malcroix Bones Academy

I heard her calling to my great-great grandmother’s spirit, telling her that she could take me now. She was excited to meet her idol, the dark witch she’d worshipped and tried to emulate most of her life, starting when she was much younger than me.

After Morticia La Fey absorbed her essence into my body, Ankha would bind us together using the La Fey Stone, along with ancient blood magics she’dalsobeen studying since she was fifteen years old. The whole process shouldn’t take more than an hour.

Two at most.

After that, she would bring my great-great grandmother to meet with the rest of their kind, and induct her formally back into Dark Cathedral.

I watched as if from a distance, as my aunt thought happily about what came next, the culmination of years and years and years?

Ankha’s ravings slowly faded.

Like rising bubbles in a still lake, my own memory rose from the depths.

“Every connection goes both ways, darling.”My mother’s achingly familiar voice, a near whisper, explaining love, explaining magic, too.“If you’re vulnerable, love, it’s because they are, too, even if they don’t know it. Even if they pretend they aren’t. In getting inside you, they’ve opened a doorway to themselves.”

I strained for my mother, screamed for her.

The longing there was so intense, it was heart-stopping, excruciating.

I chased it through that dark nothingness, tumbling faster and faster into oblivion. I fell and fell, drawn and pulled by that burning need to be with her again.

…When suddenly it all righted.

I stood on a field.

A fan of black-clad mages and witches stood in front of me, all of them wearing long, grey-silver wings. A distinct air of authority hung over them. They practically glowed with magic. A light shone in their eyes as they faced me, expressions unmoving.

No, not me, I realized; they weren’t facing me.

Ankha stood in front of them, having summoned them there.

This was another memory, but no longer mine.

I stared into the face of a stern, forty-something mage who stood in front of the rest. I found myself fascinated by his near-black eyes, his long black hair, a hard but not unattractive face. I could feel how much my aunt loathed him.Cousin Racyth.I could feel how much Ankha hated being there, needing something from him. She had nothing but contempt for her cousin, for his position, his mission, his priorities, everything about him.

But she needed him.

“I can bring her to you,”Ankha said, her words whipping in the Scottish wind.“I can bring her back. She trusts me.”

Racyth’s dark eyebrow rose. He glanced at a red-eyed witch to his right, and she raised her eyebrows in return, clearly agreeing with him. They highly doubted Clotide shared that trust with her sister, but perhaps they’d been wrong about the relationship there.

And anyway, they were obligated to follow an offer of help.

Rycyth faced Ankha.

“Why would you do that? Turn in your own sister?”he asked, blunt.

“She has something I want.”

The image of the stone rose sharply in my mind.

“…Which is, incidentally, why you can’t find her,”Ankha added coldly.“My price is the stone. Give me the La Fey Stone when it’s over, and I’ll give her to you.”

The mage looked skeptical.

More than that, I thought, he looked reluctant.

I could feel through Ankha’s mind and memories that Cousin Rycyth led the Praecuri. He took his duties seriously, but finding his cousin, Clotide La Fey, wasn’t what he considered a burning priority. He didn’t, personally, begrudge her finding happiness, even if it was with a human. He looked for her because he was tasked with the job, but he didn’t expend a lot of resources in that pursuit when his searching came up short.