“I didn’t want them dead,” she said to Gilly. “They were only fighting for some alpha tail.”
Gilly narrowed her eyes. “Wait—you mean those two alphas were fighting so close to the gate where you were watching that you got doused in blood?”
Evee nudged Gilly with a shoulder. “Stop interrogating her like you’re some kind of detective,” she said. “Give her a break. I mean, look at her. Don’t you think she’s been through enough?”
Gilly nodded slowly and clicked her tongue between her teeth. “Let me guess. You did that partial invisibility thing and went inside the compound to stop them didn’t you?”
Viv looked down at the highly polished oak floor beneath her boots.
Evee and Gilly stood up simultaneously.
“My word, please don’t tell me that’s what you did!” Evee said.
Viv glanced up at them. “I couldn’t think of anything else to do.”
Gilly stomped a foot. “I told you what you should have done. You had no business being in the middle of that compound. You could’ve gotten yourself killed. Two big alpha males like that. What were you gonna do, slap some sense into them?”
“What did you do?” Evee asked shakily, as if not really wanting to know the answer.
Viv glanced away, vividly recalling the scene as she described it to them.
When she was finished, Evee suddenly snapped her fingers. “This whole thing about your powers not working at the compound... Did you remember to read your Grimoire this morning before the feeding?”
“Now who’s playing detective?” Gilly said with a snort.
Viv glanced down again. “Yeah, well, it’s what we do every morning, right?”
“She asked if you read yours,” Gilly said, her eyes narrowing again.
“Okay, so maybe I didn’t this morning,” Viv admitted. “But that doesn’t mean I wasn’t going to when I got back. I mean, we have this routine where we read it before feeding every morning, but that’s not like a hard and fast rule.”
“Oh, Viv,” Evee said. “You know the rules. That particular one may not be hard and fast, but it’s one we’ve stuck to for years. We have to stay sharp with study. Always armed and ready for anything.”
Out of nowhere, Viv felt a nudge in her gut, an urgency that they had to look at their Grimoires right now.
As if picking up on the unspoken message, Gilly and Evee suddenly raced out of the room, and Viv knew they were going to get their books. Hesitantly, she went to the top bureau drawer and pulled out her copy. It was nearly eight inches thick, the heavy parchment pages worn, its cover weathered Elder-wood. She placed it on her bed and within moments Gilly and Evee were standing on either side of her, books in hand. They each placed their Grimoire on either side of hers.
Without a word, the sisters reached for the front cover of their book and opened them simultaneously. The three gasped in unison. Recessed in the front cover of each book was a four-inch oblong mirror. Instead of the apocalyptic scene they were used to viewing each day, the only thing reflecting from the mirrors now were swirls of gray, like billowing smoke.
“What does this mean?” Evee whispered.
“I have no idea,” Gilly said. “It’s the first time I’ve ever seen it do this.” She leaned over and sniffed at her Grimoire, then Evee’s and Viv’s. “You smell that?”
“What?” Evee copied her sister’s motion and sniffed her book. “It’s...” She frowned.
“It’s what?” Viv asked, following suit. Her Grimoire did smell a little funny. It not only carried its usual aged, worn-wood scent, there was something different, albeit faint, mixed in. “Is that nutmeg I’m smelling?”
“Cloves,” Evee said. She put her nose to Gilly’s Grimoire, then Viv’s. “Definitely cloves.”
“When the hell were these books ever around cloves?” Gilly asked. “Did you bring some back from the café?”
“Why would I do that? To stick cloves between the pages of our books?” Evette said smartly. She tsked. “That’s absurd. Absolutely not.”
Gilly shrugged and sniffed again.
Viv glanced at her sisters. “Do you think the gray in the mirrors has something to do with why my spells didn’t work at the compound?”
Gilly gave her a serious look. “It could be because of what happened at the compound. You’re the clairvoyant. What do you intuit from this?”
Viv studied the mirrors, the swirls of gray roiling ever faster. “That the future is uncertain because of something that must unfold. That’s why we can’t see anything. Something must’ve happened to change the order of what was to be.”
Gilly clamped a fist on her hip and turned to Viv. “Tell us exactly what happened when you were at the compound.”
“What are you talking about? I already did.”
“Do it again,” Gilly demanded. “Don’t leave anything out. It could have been something you did or something you said without realizing it that made this change.”
With a heavy sigh and slow shake of her head, Viv retold the story. Only this time, she included the very end. “So after I whacked Milan over the head, I turned around to leave, pointed at Stratus and told her if she wanted to play games she was on her own because I quit.”
Evee gasped.
“Wait. Wait one damn minute,” Gilly said, holding up a hand. “You said what?”
“How could you say you just quit?” Evee asked. “That’s why these mirrors are gray. I mean, did you really mean that, Viv? You’re not going to watch over the Loup Garous? You’re just going to leave them at the compound?”
“No,” Viv said. “I was just pissed off. Was in a real crappy mood. It’s not like I really meant I was quitting this whole gig for good. I just had enough for the day.”
Gilly closed her Grimoire and held it close to her chest. “Do you think the universe knows the difference between a bad mood and truth when it comes out of your mouth? You might have set something in motion, and we have no idea what that is.”
“I said I’d fix it,” Viv said, growing frustrated.
“It has to be done immediately,” Evee said, closing and picking up her own Grimoire. “Viv, you forget how powerful your words really are. When you said ‘I quit,’ you rubbed up against the aura that covers the Circle of Sisters. The universe itself. So if you’re really going to fix this, you have to go back there now.”
“I intend to,” Viv said through clenched teeth.
Neither sister responded.
Viv looked from Evee to Gilly. “Look, tell me the truth. Don’t either of you get tired of all this sometimes? What we do is not normal, even for witches. We can’t even use the spells we know to enrich our own lives. Everything gets sucked up taking care of the broods we’re responsible for. We have to babysit them because of something our great-great-times-thirty grandmother did. Why do we have to be punished for it? Don’t you get tired of it?”
“Of course I do,” Gilly said. “But quit acting like a martyr. We all get sick of it, just like any human gets sick of their job from time to time. But it is what it is. We have big responsibilities, and you can’t just throw words around like ‘I quit,’ then pretend you can just walk into your boss’s office the next day and say, ‘Oh, I really didn’t mean it. I take it back.’”
“Fine. Got it. Enough already!” Viv said, and whirled about, ready