Chapter 254: Blood Magic
Mom made a move before I was able, rushing to Dad's side while I stayed put and stared at the guy who now climbed to his feet, still in awe of his own body.
And with good reason. If he really was Sassafras, or the mortal human version of the demon cat I'd known my whole life, he'd spent the last 150 years or so in the body of a silver Persian. Being back in a two-legged body would be quite a shock.
For all of us.
The skin around his eyes tightened as he slowly approached me, seeming to stumble over his own feet. The color settled to deep brown, almost black. "Syd," he said in my cat's voice, "are you okay?"
I couldn't face it, couldn't deal. Maybe I should have been happy for him. Wasn't this what Sass had wanted forever? But a terrible fear rose inside me, an understanding that for him to be the way he was now meant the possibility of some horrible consequences for my father.
If there could be more horrible consequences than the ones he faced for using blood magic.
Galleytrot limped to my side, tongue swiping over my cheek as I turned from the young man with Sassy's soul inside him and to my parents. Mom was just pulling away from Dad, all trace of blood and his injury gone, the knife nowhere to be seen. I gaped at her, guilt and shock keeping me in thrall as her crying blue eyes met mine.
"Swear," she said, voice low, throaty, as if she had to force the words past her weeping, "swear you won't tell anyone what's happened here."
"Mom." I choked that out myself. "What did you do?"
She shook her head, terror at war with anger. "Swear to me, Syd."
Meira had crawled to Mom's side, crying openly. "I swear, Mom," she said.
I couldn't, just couldn't. The part of me that understood what this meant for our family fought tooth and nail with my honesty and honor. She just covered up the fact Dad used blood magic. In our house. At our coven site. The worst crime, the most vile, hated, condemned. And yet... revealing she'd chosen to protect Dad likely meant both of their deaths.
I had no time to answer the demand in her eyes, one of her hands latching onto my wrist as the kitchen door above us slammed open and Erica's desperate contact made it through the house wards. Mom must have blocked her off the moment she understood what Dad had done.
Syd. Her touch was a thin thread so fragile I knew her thoughts remained only between us. Please.
Erica pounded down the stairs, long blonde hair in disarray, a group of witches arriving behind her. Her panic was clear in her face, in her magic, as she reached for us both.
"What happened?" She looked around, frantic, as though the reason for the disturbance in the family power was about to leap out and attack her. "We all felt it, Miriam. Is everything okay?"
Mom looked away from me, her voice returning to coven leader normal. Which meant she was lying or covering something up. I'd learned to understand that particular tone over the years.
"Everything is under control," she said smoothly while Erica's expression flickered. She knew Mom as well as I did. "Thank you for coming, but I'm taking care of it."
Dull, heavy footfalls thudded down the wooden steps. I forced myself not to look, knowing who owned those bulky, utilitarian shoes. Even before she spoke, I felt Celeste Oberman's suspicion as her magic snaked out, sniffing around.
Crap. Crap. Crap. There was no way she'd miss the feeling of blood magic. No. Way.
We were totally screwed.
"Who is he?" Erica was staring at the guy in the pentagram, they all were, the sight of him enough even to distract Celeste. I caught her out of the corner of my eye, moving around us, her long brown braid swinging so close to me I could see the threads of gray running through it.
"It's me, Erica," the boy said. I couldn't bring myself to call him by his name, not yet.
She had no trouble. "Sassafras?" Her blue eyes stared, they all stared, and I was glad.
It meant a few more seconds of safety, a handful of heartbeats remaining before the coven unearthed the truth and my father was sentenced to death.
"All we know," Mom said, "is one of Harry's attempts to return home has failed. Clearly the resulting backlash has affected Sassafras." Her eyes met mine. "I haven't had time to uncover what's happened."
My guilt was a living thing, wrapping around my heart, stabbing me over and over, only growing worse as I held it in. But I did. And the longer I did, the more committed I was to keeping it inside, to enduring the endless remorse if only to save Dad's life.
A small price to pay, my own eternal suffering.
My power reached for Mom's, linked with her. It was then, in that moment when I opened up to her, I understood she did more than heal him of his telltale injury. She'd done something, channeled the family magic in a way I could no longer feel the taint of negative magic anywhere in the basement.
Or the rest of the house for that matter. Maybe Mom hadn't done it. The family magic itself would have ejected any trace of blood energy, so it's possible she wasn't guilty. And until I talked to her, it was also possible she wasn't covering it up, that said family magic also healed him.
Possible.
Dad groaned softly and we all focused on him. I could feel the coven hovering over my shoulder, lining the staircase, a few stepping down with ginger caution to the concrete floor as though fearful whatever he'd done wasn't over.
But it was, long over. As he opened his eyes, I felt the change in him, heard Mom cry out in soft despair, reached for his hand and held it, without the familiar touch of his magic to link us together.
But his magic was here, I could feel it. "Dad," I whispered.
His blue eyes, now ordinary, handsome face just a human face, turned toward me.
"Syd," he whispered. I reached for him, for his power, felt nothing, not even a latent hint deep inside. I knew Mom was doing the same, felt it in her weeping.
I sat back, clutching both hands to my throat, turning away from him and toward the guy who stared at me like he'd never seen any of us before.
The power. Dad's magic. It was here, of course it was.
In Sassafras.
***
