He put the black stone back in his pocket. “I’m not sure. For years, whenever I tried to scry for the baby, the results were . . . confused. It was like the baby’s location was bouncing back and forth, which made it impossible for me to pinpoint.” He lifted his empty hands in a helpless gesture. “Eventually, I restricted myself to checking once a year, then every two years. I moved to Nova Scotia, opened a shop there, but I kept my ear to the ground. Last month I was at a small business conference in Chicago. An old friend had heard about a powerful boundary witch who had appeared in Colorado, seemingly out of nowhere. Honestly, my heart just lit up.” He beamed. “I tried scrying again, and this time it led me straight to you.”
I barely heard this last part. My thoughts were stuck on the words bouncing back and forth. “Twins,” I blurted. “There were two of us. That’s why you couldn’t find us when we were little.”
He started. “Two of you? The ultrasound never . . . there must have been a mistake.”
He stood up, displacing Gus-Gus, who stalked away indignantly. Emil walked a few feet away, staring out the window. “Of course, of course,” he muttered. “I’m such an idiot; I should have realized . . . two babies.” He paused to look at me. “Was it a second girl? Is she an active witch, too? Do you—”
“She’s dead,” I said. It came out harsher than I expected. “She died last year.”
His excitement faded, and he sank back down into the chair. “I’m so sorry, Allison.”
People call me that by mistake all the time, but this time it sort of stung. “Nobody calls me that,” I told him. “It’s Lex.”
He nodded absently, taking that in stride. “May I ask how she died?”
“She was murdered by a werewolf in Los Angeles.” It was on the tip of my tongue to add “she left behind a daughter,” but some instinct kept my mouth shut. The guy didn’t need to know about Charlie, not until I was sure I could trust him.
Then a stray thought caught up with me. “Wait. If Valerya—if my mother was a boundary witch, why did she die in childbirth? Why didn’t the magic bring her back?” I had personally died three times, and Valerya sounded stronger than me. More practiced, at least.
He nodded as though he’d expected the question. “I gave that a lot of thought,” he said, “after the location spells revealed that she was dead. I realized there was only one thing that could have happened. You—or perhaps your sister—must have been at risk. Dying. Val was powerful; she would have been able to access the magic to trade one life for another.” He spread his hands again.
Tears began to run down my cheeks as I put it together. Me. I had been in distress, and Valerya had given her life to save mine. Because that’s what mothers do.
I stood up abruptly. “I’m sorry, I—I—”
“It’s all right,” Emil rose, too. “I’ve given you a lot to absorb in a very short time, Al—sorry, Lex. I’d like to speak to you more, if that’s all right?” I did something with my head that was sort of like a nod. “Yes, well, I’m staying at the St. Julien for a few days. You can give me a call there when you’re ready.”
My birth father was alive. I had a biological family. I think I walked him out, but I don’t remember anything else either of us might have said. This was just . . . too much.
I longed for someone to talk to about it, but who? John would have been good, but he was at Disney World, and he was still upset with me anyway. I hesitated to call anyone from the Luther family, because any interest I expressed in my birth parents might hurt them. Quinn was dead until night fell, and Simon and Lily . . . well, I was indirectly the cause of much of the turmoil that was currently affecting their whole clan. It didn’t seem right to call and complain about my own family.
I dropped back onto the couch, ignoring the cat and two dogs that vied for my attention. I was kidding myself. There was only one person I wanted to talk to just then, but she happened to be dead. Last year I’d learned that I could talk to her spirit in my dreams, but I hadn’t been able to contact her in months, not since my Iraq nightmares began.
I desperately wanted to talk to her, but I didn’t think I could handle any more nightmares quite yet. But in the past, hadn’t I been able to call her whenever I really needed her? Maybe if I went to sleep, I would see her?
In the end, my body sort of made the decision for me. I’d only had a few hours of sleep, and when exhaustion began to sink in, I laid down on the couch, prayed for my sister, and let sleep come.
Chapter 8
When I opened my eyes again, I was not in the desert.
I sighed with relief, looking around the walls of the bedroom that Sam and I had shared as teenagers. I didn’t know if I chose this place or if Sam did, or if it was some combined effort of our subconsciouses, but this was where we always spoke, and it looked just like it always had. The old familiar posters, the bedspread, the stacks of books on the small desk we shared—everything was as it should be.
And there was my sister. She was sitting cross-legged on her bed, leaning against the wall to face me. This was how I’d last seen her in life—brunette pixie cut, black leggings, draped top that hid her little postpartum paunch. She was grinning so hard she was practically bouncing in place.
A rush of relief, love, and grief poured into me at once. “Hey, Sammy,” I said.