Page 11

Alonso

ALONSO FLIES INTO HIS HOME, PROPELLED LIKE A ROCKET. HE WISHES he could shed parts of himself, that he could spend the rest of his life floating in some great void. Instead, he’s stuck on Earth, with this new knowledge making his heart pound against his ribs like an angry fist.

The De Luca sisters are gathered around their circular dining table, holding hands like they’re about to do a séance. But instead of whispering spells to rouse the dead, their heads are bowed, and they’re silent. Aunt Emilia’s shoulders shake as she cries, but she doesn’t make a sound.

They’ve heard the news.

Alonso stands there, arms limp at his sides, waiting for them to acknowledge him. And when they don’t, he explodes.

“We have to do something!” he says, but it comes out as a scream.

Aunt Emilia jumps, thin hands gripping the arms of her chair. Aunt Donna narrows her eyes at him as she blows cigarette smoke out of her nose. But Alonso’s mother doesn’t move. Her head is bowed low, as if he didn’t say a word. As if he isn’t even there.

“It’s Penny’s mom,” he says, his own voice ringing in his ears.

“Indeed,” Aunt Donna says.

“We hoped you would hear it from us,” Emilia says, and then she dissolves into sobs again, audible this time.

If their dining room table wasn’t carved from a giant oak, Alonso would flip it. He’s vibrating like his body can’t contain him. He’s too big. Too angry. Anchor image , he thinks, but he can’t even remember what his anchor image is anymore. All he sees is Penny’s face.

So many people have died because of Grandpa Giovanni’s curse. But somehow, even in Alonso’s wildest dreams, he never imagined Penny would be dragged into this. Because he’s naive. He somehow convinced himself Penny existed in a fantasy world where blissful ignorance about magic would protect her.

And now her mom doesn’t stand a chance unless they do something.

“Mom,” Alonso says, “you have to call the Council.”

Vera De Luca speaks in a low, threatening voice.

“You will not use that tone with us, Alonso Pietro De Luca. You don’t decide what we will and won’t do.”

“But—”

“No.” Vera is on her feet, hands slamming the table. Her eyes are bright red, whether from crying or being too stressed to blink, it’s impossible to tell. Alonso knows he should be afraid, but he’s never been that smart.

“I can’t stand by and let this happen. If you’re too much of a coward to call the Council, then I will.”

Donna and Emilia inhale sharply. Alonso expects his mom to scream at him. Throwing something would be a nice touch. He’s ready for it, too. He’s full of fight and he has nowhere to put it, and he’s aching for someone to say the words that will push him over the edge. He wants to lose control. Alonso is a sane person in an insane world and he can’t be held responsible for his actions.

And then, as Alonso’s anger reaches a crescendo, his mom deflates like a balloon. She curves in on herself, one spindly hand covering her face, catching strands of her blond hair.

“We went to high school together,” Vera says. “We were lab partners once.”

It’s worse than anything Alonso’s mom could’ve screamed or thrown at him, because it’s defeat. The De Luca sisters won’t call the Council. Alonso would, but he knows what will happen. His family is exiled. Magic-less. And the Council can’t do anything to help anyone. It’s worse than not mattering; this is his family’s punishment. Their burden to carry.

What happens to Mrs. Emberly is all their fault.

Alonso isn’t shaking anymore. He’s empty, even though he doesn’t want to be. He dares a glance at his mom, but she’s ignoring him again. Even if she wasn’t, Vera wouldn’t see the way Alonso needs her, and he has too much pride to ever ask her for anything. But just this once, couldn’t she sense what he needs without him having to say a word?

It’s not Alonso’s mom who brings him back to himself. It’s Aunt Donna. She walks over and puts a hand on his shoulder, though it’s more of a pat than anything. A lit cigarette sits in the holder at the end of her silver ring. The smoke envelops them, making Alonso’s eyes water. He blinks through the tears and looks at her for help. He needs direction. Distraction.

Aunt Donna raises her chin, understanding barely visible in the firm set of her mouth.

“Go clean the cat box, will you?” she says. “Nimble’s been shitting up a storm.”

Alonso is barely conscious as he dumps the litter and disinfects the plastic cat box with gloved hands. The AC is off, and the smell turns his stomach. He’s sweating through his tank top.

Nimble appears a few feet away, staring at him from the shadow of a fiddle-leaf fig.

“What did you eat?” Alonso says.

Nimble blinks, unconcerned her poop smells especially bad. Then she steps gingerly over to the basement door. “Meow,” she says, arching her back and looking at him expectantly.

Alonso grits his teeth. It’s disconcerting, having a magical connection with a cat that allows her to basically read his mind. “I’m not going down there.”

He returns to litter-box duty, but Nimble isn’t done. This time, she rubs up against the basement door, making it creak on its hinges.

“Shit,” Alonso says, rushing over to stop the door from moving. He pauses, waiting to see if his mom or aunts heard anything. It isn’t that the basement is off-limits, but he doesn’t want them asking questions. After all, why would Alonso suddenly show an interest in the basement when he hates anything and everything having to do with their magical lineage? Not to mention they have no idea Nimble is Alonso’s familiar. Without magic, his family can’t sense the energy binding him to her—which is why it’s always inconvenient when Nimble decides to show off how smart she is. Alonso doesn’t need his family getting suspicious.

“Meow,” Nimble says, putting her paws on Alonso’s calf and unsheathing her claws.

He curses and moves his leg away. “Fine! Stop being annoying.”

She lets out a victorious mew as he opens the door. Alonso closes it quietly behind them, and it isn’t until he’s sure nobody is coming that he descends the narrow wooden staircase.

The unfinished basement is a glorified storage unit, the concrete floor piled high with boxes of the cardboard and plastic varieties. Alonso flips the switch, and the light bulb hanging from the ceiling takes five full seconds to turn on.

Nimble has disappeared into the shadows, leaving Alonso all on his own to find the book he needs. And, unfortunately for him, every single one of these boxes is full of books. All of his family’s spell books, grimoires, and other magical texts are down here and Alonso needs to find a single folktale in one of them.

“You gonna help me out?” Alonso says into the dark.

Nimble doesn’t respond.

“I hate myself,” he mutters, and then he gets to work.

Twenty minutes later, when Alonso is opening his seventh box, Nimble shows herself. She’s sitting on a box in the far corner, tail swishing back and forth.

“Decided to make yourself useful?” Alonso says. Nimble might be annoying, but her instincts are unusually sharp. It probably has something to do with the fact that she died once.

Sure enough, when Alonso digs through the box Nimble chose as her throne, he finds what he’s looking for: an ancient volume bound in silver fabric and full of old folktales, told and retold by witches for centuries.

When Alonso was a kid, before he found Nimble, his mother and aunts would send him away after dinner so they could continue drinking wine without feeling like bad influences. But Alonso would always sneak out of bed and sit outside the dining room so he could hear them talk in low whispers. Mostly their conversations were boring, but sometimes they talked about things Alonso knew he could never repeat.

A few times, they talked about Park HaeJung.

Across the world, covens are generally in agreement that Park HaeJung was the most powerful witch to have ever lived. There are a million stories about her, and while some have probably been exaggerated over time, others have too much supporting evidence to deny—thanks to the copious notes of monarchy-era Korean covens.

Alonso is looking for one particular story, and he finds it near the back of this book. His eyes fly across the words:

In 1402, the Kaesong Park coven in the central kingdom of Joseon was near extinction. Four generations earlier, the matriarch Park ChoHui had cursed a family of merchants after learning that they were underpaying her family for their produce. This curse afflicted every firstborn child in the merchant’s family with a slow, painful illness that resulted in death before their tenth birthday. When the townsfolk realized what they’d done, the Kaesong Park coven was shunned, and their land was taken by the royal family. Years of hardship, depression, and regret weighed on the coven until almost every member died. The final surviving family descendant was young Park HaeJung.

Though HaeJung was only a young witch, her power was great, and her determination was greater. After years of effort, HaeJung accessed her grandmother’s magic through their blood connection and broke the curse, saving many members of the merchant’s family and ensuring the future of her own coven.

Alonso flips the page, but that’s the end of the story. He already knew HaeJung left no record of the incantation she used, or details of the ritual, because she was infamous for her lack of record-keeping. But he thought the story might give him some clue about how he could do the same—break a curse after its creator was long gone.

But there’s nothing. No clues at all.

Alonso sighs, snapping the useless book shut. What this bedtime story fails to mention is that Park HaeJung was a preternaturally gifted witch. Of course it was possible for her to break the curse of a long-dead witch. But breaking the Barrion curse is impossible. Alonso isn’t some once-in-a-millennium witch. What happened with Nimble was a fluke.

Alonso sniffles. He hates crying, probably because he does it all the time. Almost immediately, Nimble jumps onto Alonso’s lap and starts kneading his legs.

“I give up,” Alonso mutters.

Nimble goes still. When Alonso looks at her, she’s staring at him, her pupils dilating.

“What?”

The light bulb above them flickers once, twice, three times. As the light goes on and off, Nimble’s shadow grows larger on the basement floor.

The hair on the back of Alonso’s neck stands up. “That’s not funny.”

The light keeps flickering, and it might be Alonso’s imagination, but it looks like Nimble’s shadow has eyes. And giant claws. And they’re reaching for his ankle—

Alonso stands fast, knocking over his chair. Nimble drops to the floor, where she lands with perfect grace and stares up at him, the picture of innocence.

“Fuck,” Alonso says, wiping the sweat from his brow. “I said what I said. I don’t care how spooky you are, I’m done with this shit.” He makes it halfway up the stairs before he turns around and adds, “You’re sleeping in the living room tonight.”

The light flickers again, and Alonso takes the rest of the stairs two at a time.