Page 40

There was a fire in Sithe’s eyes, from a place that had no name. Godric flinched, and looked like he suddenly wanted to bolt from the room. He bit his lip, squinted his eyes against a sudden dampness, and hung his head low.

“Listen to me. Both of you. Look at me.”

Godric lifted his head again, reluctantly. Fuller snapped to attention.

“What Gregor Abney would have done to that girl is far worse than ‘letting her die.’ You only saw a handful of public signs. Sythius and I ... saw the truth. Why do you think I handled this case myself, bringing in backup that I barely knew, rather than having you two at my back?”

Fuller shrugged. “I don’t know. Why?”

“Abney was a blood witch.”

Godric blinked. “Like you?” he dared to ask.

“No. Not like me. The man used his wives as breed-sows, and his children as currency. His twelve children. I interrogate demons. I manipulate demons. He traded with them. Do you understand what I’m telling you? He handed over twelve children, each of them Breanne’s age or younger, to creatures beyond mortal comprehension. Have you any idea what demons do to their sacrifices?”

Both twins shook their heads in unison.

“Ripped. Torn apart. Burned into horrid things. Bones, taken out and stitched onto other bodies. Eyes, gouged out for decorations. Any abomination you can conjure in your imagination, I assure you: they’ve come up with worse. The sorts of things that we humans think of, when we say the word ‘evil.’ Rape. Torture. Starvation. Murder. Those are the baseline. They’re warm-up exercises. You might think I’m exaggerating, or that I’m spouting off pixie stories. I’m not.”

Silence strangled, and daylight seemed to shy away from the room.

Sithe leaned forward, standing up and slamming her hands on her writing desk.

Both boys jumped.

“You need to understand: we didn’t just save that girl’s life. We took her from the brink of a void so incomprehensibly vile that to look at it would drive you gibbering mad. Maybe it will take time. More than the others. Maybe we won’t be able to give her back the life she had, with her brother and her friends. Maybe she will have nightmares for the rest of her life. But if you’ve never trusted me before, then trust me now: it’s better than the alternative. Don’t you dare think you’ve done her a disservice by guiding me to her.”

Godric bowed his head. “... Yes, Matron.”

Fuller followed suit. “Thank you, Matron.”

* * *

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