“But your mom is still alive,” Carly points out, as if that fixes things.
I shake my head. “Eric's not watching her.” I point to the date next to Mom's name. “I don't think she's the target anymore. They all have dates except for me. I'm the last one.”
“It's too much of a coincidence, you being both a Siren and Maximillian's descendant. All the Sirens must be descended from him. But if the Siren has to have his blood in them, where are Taylin's and Matt's Sirens?” Carly runs her palm down the family tree.
I glance around the room but don't see any more trees, although my gaze catches a scattering of pictures on a table. I move over and rub my hands over them. Luke riding his bike, playing hockey, grocery shopping. Taylin yelling at a tall, gray-haired man. Matt throwing a football in practice. Recent pictures.
I spread them out with my fingertips. “Maybe there's another branch that Eric hasn't listed on my family tree. Or maybe there just aren't any more of them yet.” I look at Carly and swallow hard. “Maybe their Sirens are my kids or my grandkids.”
“So the bastard doomed his own descendants to be murdered by the three of them,” Carly says.
“But he had his daughter hidden away, protected by the guardians.”
“Was she a Siren, then?” Carly asks.
“Taylin said she was quiet but could sing,” I remember out loud. “And Deidre could sing, enthralled people. Maximillian called her his Siren.”
“So the Siren gene, or whatever,” Carly says as she picks up Matt's picture, “was passed on to you from Deidre,” she glances at the family tree, “through her daughter. But if you die now, then Taylin and Matt are free. So⦔
“Maximillian set up the guardians to keep me alive so I can have kids or grandkids or great-grandkids,” I say in horror, “so that one day Taylin or Matt will go crazy, too, and murder them.”
We stare at each other again for a long moment. I watch Carly's eyes strengthen. She purses her lips. “We won't tell them.” She rips my family tree off the wall, shaking her head. “None of them. Luke, Taylin, Matt. They'll never know. We'll get you awayâ”
“No,” I cut her off and take the folded sheet of paper from her.
“Jule, if they find out that your death is the end to their curse, it would be like calling open season on Jule Welsh.”
I huff softly. “Carly, do you really think Matt would kill me to end the curse?”
Carly pauses for a long exhale. “I don't know. Taylin would, though. And if Matt knew that his sister would be free, that his brother wouldn't go insane with super-human strength⦔ She shakes her head. Her voice drops. “Why would he stop Luke next time?”
A noise from somewhere at the back of the house cuts into our debate. I fold the family tree into as small a square as I can and shove it in my back pocket.
Carly looks at me. “Luke or Eric?” I shake my head mutely. “Either way, let's get out of here.”
Carly steps back out through the small space between the brick alcove and the Ashes' den. Her scream freezes me solid where I stand, still inside the cramped space.
“Stop!”
It takes my brain only the space of one heartbeat to identify the command. Eric rushes through the den to his sister. But he yells to me. “Stop, Jule! Don't come out!” he yells above Carly's screams. “Or the same will happen to you!”
His words penetrate as I watch Carly thrash around in a circle as Eric grabs her. “Let go! You're a stalker, a psycho, a would-be murderer!” Carly shrieks hysterically. She rants for another minute while Eric tries to hold her.
I watch helplessly as panic and paranoia stampede through her. I shake my head and feel the press of tears burn the back of my eyes. “Mom,” I whisper, my lips barely moving as I watch the scene with my mom play out again, but this time with my best friend. Dad trying to subdue her without hurting her. Mom screaming, ranting, throwing my clothes into a suitcase. Shrieking that I was going to be killed, that the Ashes were evil, that I had to leave and never sing again. Me punching in 911 on the phone and stepping outside so I could hear the operator above the screams.
Eric wraps Carly in some sort of hold and starts chanting. At first I think I can understand his words, but then I realize it's in some other language. His eyes flicker shut as his voice grows.
“Desiste! Tranquilla animum! Tranquilla corpus! Rumpe incantionem! Quiesce!”
He repeats the ancient words over and over, and slowly Carly calms. Her eyelids sag. Her screams mute into whimpers.
“What are you doing to her?” I yell.
Eric continues to chant, but his stare pins me inside the room. He shakes his head, a silent command not to come out. He closes his eyes again and breathes deeply as he recites the words. The choppy phrases grow into a pattern of high and low, following a beat, a cadence that transforms it almost into a song. Carly slumps against him, unconscious, and he lays her on the same couch she'd been sprawled across the night her memory was wiped. Eric turns to me.
“It's a trap.” His gaze travels the edge of the narrow space. “You can get in, but getting out ignites the panic center in a person.”
“Like in my mom,” I half sneer.
“She was snooping,” he says. “But I'm sorry that happened. The hospital wouldn't let us near her. She wouldn't, either. So we couldn't help undo the damage. It had to wear off on its own.” He moves closer.
“Are you going to let me out?”
Eric runs his ring along the perimeter of the space, briefly closing his eyes. His lips move silently. He steps back. “It's open now.”
I step gingerly through, but don't feel the tingle I had before. Eric reaches up to the top shelf and pushes an old book back in place. The shelves move, shutting off the room. We stare at each other. What is he going to do? Make us forget we found the room? Will he search my pockets and find the family tree? I press back against the bookcase, cornered.
“You're wrong about them, Eric,” I start.
“You're in danger, Jule. It's my sacred duty to protect you and ensure that you continue the bloodline. We've been protecting you all along.”
We?
“Who's we?”
Continue the bloodline?
Like, make sure I procreate? A chill scratches up my back, but then he starts to talk again.
“But you're not helping. Those three are The Cursed. They murdered an innocent woman centuries ago. They want to murder you, and yet you continue to hang out with them. You trust the damned, the ones who seek to kill you.” His face contorts into a furious, self-righteous frown.
“That's not true!” I yell. Eric takes a step closer to me. “Maximillian killed Deidre, not them. They only tried to stop him, and his dark magic killed his wife and then himself. Maximillian is the murderer, not Luke, not Matt or Taylin.”
Eric blinks, a look of confusion freezing his movements for a split second. But he seems to shake it off. “I belong to a long line of protectors, Jule. Guardians who witnessed the birth of the curse. They chronicled it, passed on the dictates, the honorable duty of protecting your line. The Sirens. Luke Whitmore is cursed to kill you.”
“We're trying to break the curse, Eric.” I slide along the wall closer to the window as Eric advances. “Help us. End this craziness. Don't be a murderer like Maximillian and those crazy first guardians.”
“We are protectors of the innocent, Jule.” His eyes plead. “Not murderers.”
“Then help me help them. By trying to kill them, you might kill me, too, since I'm so close to them. And then the curse
will
be broken. Is that what you want?”
He looks at me, his head tilting slightly in thought. “Is that what
you
want?”
“What? No!” I deny him at top volume. But exactly who I'm yelling at, I'm not sure. Eric, or me? Doesn't matter at the moment. “You almost killed me today by dropping that chandelier.”
He frowns. “I don't think it would have killed you or Taylin. It was meant to scare her. And you got in the way.”
“Exactly what I'm saying! And that revved-up spider, that was just sadistic. Stop trying to kill people and help us break this fricking stupid curse!”
“What spider?”
“The one that bit Matt, like, six times. He's in the hospital, you know.”
“I didn't put a spider anywhere near him.”
“Yeah, right. Like a magically-revved black widow just happened to find its way into Matt's football helmet.” I huff loudly. “I'm just saying, stop. Stop and come talk to them. Listen to their side of the story. Your story's been handed down over two hundred years. Their story is first-hand.”
Eric pauses. “I'm part of a massive organization with procedures and facts pulled from substantial data. Luke's story is colored by blinding emotions. My side is history, and history reports the facts.”
“Massive organization? Are they all watching me?”
Eric's stubborn line cracks into a small, cocky grin. “No. The Magic Alliance has evolved from a few followers protecting our founder's bloodline to a world-wide organization tracking all types of magic. We protect those who could be harmed by dark magic and help those with natural talent to hone their white magic skills.”
God! An organization founded by the lunatics who brutally killed three teenagers. I shake my head. “Your organization has no idea what really went on in that room when Maximillian ordered your founders to slaughter three unarmed kids in retaliation for a wrong they didn't commit. Your âhistory,'” I use quote marks in the air, “is slanted by personal emotion, too. Yet your data is old and handed down, altered to justify stalking people.” Eric frowns at my words. “But you can slow down. Hear their side of history and decide for yourself without your organization telling you what to think.”
Eric looks down as if contemplating what I said. I hold my breath. Carly moans on the couch and we both turn to her. Eric shakes his head. “Iâ¦I have to think.” He pushes on his forehead like he has a headache.
“That's fine,” I say and take another step toward the window. Although how I think I can get the window open, kick out the screen, and jump through before Eric stops me, I don't know. “Just think about it. But while you're thinking, don't try any more stupid stunts.”
Eric's eyebrows pinch together. OopsâI probably shouldn't have said “stupid.”
“What happened?” Carly mumbles.
I glare at Eric. I am so angry I momentarily forget my fear. “Did you fuck with her memory again? God, Eric, you're going to give your own sister a brain tumor!”
Carly rubs her head. “What are you cursing about, Jule?”
“Sorry, Jule,” Eric says and grabs for me. “You need to forget what you saw. You're safer that way, safer not knowing how pivotal you are.”
I dodge behind the alabaster form of some ancient goddess and the pedestal wobbles. “Carly, help!”
Carly stands up, her hands out. “What's going on? Eric, why are you chasing Jule?”
Eric holds out his finger to Carly. “Wait there.” He sounds out of breath, out of control. “I'll come back to you.”
“Come back to her to erase her memory again, you mean!” I shriek as Eric lunges. “Carly, run!”
Carly hesitates, but runs out of the den. Eric wraps his pumped-up biceps around me, pinning my arms to my sides. I struggle in vain, helpless against his physical superiority. He starts to yell out the Latin words from before and I scream right in his ear, a drawn out, high-pitched note, an alarm higher than that of a fire alarm. The window to my right shatters, and for a moment I think my vocal vibrations have a new use. But a large body follows the shards of glass and hits the hardwood floor with a tremendous
thump
and
crack
. The mass moves like a leaping beast and Eric is snatched away from me. I grab my arms automatically to rub away the crushing feel of Eric's strength and then realize that I'm on the floor. I scoot back against the wall with my knees bent before me and watch. Stunned. Silent. Scared.
Luke balances Eric over his head on extended arms, like Eric's bulk is nothing more than the bench-press bar at a gym. Eric's thrashing accomplishes nothing and Luke starts to spin him around, his bare arms bunching and lined with the black outlines of dragons. He uses one hand to brace against Eric's torso and the other to whip him around like he's a child on some psycho fair ride. I hear the ripping sounds of Eric's twisted shirt as it twines around Luke's hand, tearing at the seams. Luke's face is a mask of rage as he searches me out. His dark eyes lock on mine. They are sharp, predatory, merciless. Eric cries out and starts to gag.
“Luke,” I call. “Stop. You'll hurt him.” Part of me shrugs at the possibility. Isn't that what Eric has been doing to Luke's family? Isn't that what guardians plan to do to the person I've fallen in love with? But the core of me, the base on which my conscience stands, knows that preemptive retaliation is not the answer. Could I love someone who would kill, not in self-defense, but in rage? For rage is what Luke is full of right now. I wonder if Eric truly is the target, or maybe it's me because I screamed. It's obvious the curse has revved Luke full of supernatural power, power meant to spill my blood.
I slide up the wall. “Luke.” I shake my head. “No. Don't become Maximillian. That's what he wanted.” I hold my hands out like I'm confronting a rabid animal. “Don't let him win.”
Luke stops, but still holds Eric above his head. He breathes hard and shakes his head like he's trying to clear his mind. I can tell he's fighting for control.
“Put me down!” Eric yells through gritted teeth. His face is bright red, his eyes wide. He struggles up in the air to grab Luke, but Luke hardly notices the useless attempts.
I nod. “Put him down. Let's go find Taylin. She can help you calm down. Okay?”