Part 15 (1/2)
”If you want to leave, then leave the normal way,” I say, even though part of me flinches along with Uncle Morris. It's not his fault. He gives his goatee a little tug and then, moving faster than I've seen him move in a long time, he hurries toward the door. Pausing, he looks at me, opens his mouth as if to say something, then seems to think better of it. Opening the door, he slips out, and I am left with the look in his eyes. Hurt and bewildered.
”Is this why you didn't tell me? You thought I'd be stopping people all the time from being ... themselves.”
”No,” my mother says quietly.
”No, we didn't tell you because your grandmother asked us not to. Because she said that although she didn't exactly know why, one day you would need what we could give you.”
”And what is that?”
”She ... she never could say. All she knew was that one day you would need to make a choice and that to raise you the way we did would help you when the time came.”
”Who else?” I demand.
”Who else knows about me?”
”No one. Just your grandmother, your father, and I.” My mother tucks a piece of hair behind her ear.
”And, of course, Rowena.”
”Rowena,” I echo. Of course. Perfect Rowena, who will take over the family one day. Even though I've always known this, I still can't stop this bitter spill of thoughts. In one small corner of my mind, all day I had been harboring this crazy, silly hope that now that I did really have a power, maybe I would be the d.a.m.n beacon that my grandmother had foretold-whatever that meant. That for once Rowena wouldn't have the lock on being so Talented, so special. That maybe I would be the one to guide my family in ... I shake my head to scatter those thoughts.
”I can't believe you went along with this,” I accuse my mother now. A low growl of thunder rattles past the windowpanes, and my father's expression, usually so mild and benign, much like a warm spring rain, has now s.h.i.+fted into something sharper.
”If that's you doing that, then stop,” I snap at him.
”Or I'll stop it for you.” Both of my parents stare at me as if I'm a changeling, but I'm past caring. My father opens his mouth, but I rush in.
”Who is this person? Alistair Callum?” My mother sighs.
”Long ago,” she begins, overriding whatever my father was going to say,”long ago there was a war.” Somehow I have a feeling I'm not about to hear a lecture on the American Revolution.
”A struggle, really, between our family and another much more powerful family.
This other family believed in things that... our family did not.” She pauses as if contemplating those things, then continues hurriedly.
”We captured their power and managed to isolate it into one object-it's not clear exactly how,” she says, obviously antic.i.p.ating my next question.
”Our history tells us that four members of our family acted together to work a powerful spell and that they made a great sacrifice to do this.” She stops, clasps her hands, and recites, ”One stood for North, and one stood for South; one stood for East, and one stood for West. North summoned Air, and South carried Water; East called Fire, and West bore Earth. And all were bound together.” I stare at her.
”Um ... that tells me nothing,” I say at last and am rewarded with a reproving frown from my mother before she continues.
”Anyway, that's what we call the Domani-where all this other family's power remains. Anyone who was and is linked to this family through their bloodlines was and is affected by this spell. And of course we hid the Domani very carefully.”
”Why didn't you just destroy it?” My father clears his throat.
”Don't you go to school?” This seems like a particularly odd question to ask right now. But he continues.
”Science cla.s.s?” Now this is beginning to make more sense. My father loves science. Einstein, Newton, Mendel-they're all his heroes. Whenever possible, he interjects science into the conversation. Never mind if no one's in the mood for it.
”Remember the rule that matter can neither be created nor destroyed? Well, that applies here.”
”Just changed,” my mother adds softly.
”Can it change back?” My mother takes a breath.
”You mean, can they recapture it and reawaken it?” I nod and the fire pops and hisses just as she answers, ”Yes,” so the word is lost in the shadowy recesses of the room.
”We think it already has reawakened. Somehow.” That somehow goes ringing through me like a cold clanging bell. And then I hear the man in the frock coat's words again. You really don't know what you've done, do you?
SIXTEEN.
”THE CLOCK. The clock that he wanted me to find. That was the Domani, wasn't it?” My mother puts her hand on my father's arm as he stares at me and explains urgently, ”Tamsin's met him before. He came into the store over the summer and asked her to help him. He's a professor. Or so he claims,” she finishes.
”At your school?” my father says, startled.
”No, Rowena's school,” I say sarcastically. Then I bite my lip.
”Sorry. At NYU, actually.”
”But I don't... why did he ask you for help?” my fatherasks.
”Thanks,” I say.
”Tamsin,” my father says sharply.
”That is not at all what I meant. What I meant was, why would he come into the bookstore if he knows anything about this family at all and expect you to help him?”
”What you don't know is that there's a spell of protection cast over this family. It doesn't extend very far,” my mother adds weakly.
”Not far beyond the borders of this town.” I think on this for a second. That explains my mother's deep dislike of anywhere that's not Hedgerow.
”And of course, the spell wouldn't work on you anyway. Which is why he was able to approach you in the bookstore.” I scrunch my toes together.
”I pretended to be Rowena.”
”You what?” my mother and father say at the same time, both of them staring at me.
”He thought I was Rowena and I ... just went along with it. Later he found out that I wasn't.” I decide not to mention how much later.
”How did you find it for him?” my mother asks.
”The clock? How?”
”I saw it. In a painting. At Uncle Chester and Aunt Rennie's house. And then I ...
went there and got it.”