Purity (8 page)

“We both know why you’re grounded.”

“I know.” But I couldn’t help glancing longingly at the window, wishing I could be out there doing anything, anything at all, as long as it wasn’t sitting at that dinner table with my grumpy father.

“You aren’t going out there.”

“I know, Dad.”

“And speaking of that, hand over your phone.”

I gaped at him. “Seriously? What if I have an accident on the way to the library and need to call an ambulance?”

“Perdita.”

“Fine.” I reluctantly handed over the phone, but it killed me to let go of my last grasp of freedom.

“And stop with the puppy dog eyes. Right now,” he snapped.

“I wasn’t even looking at you,” I muttered.

“She hasn’t done anything wrong, Stephen,” Gran said, but her voice shook.

Dad glared at her, and she looked down at her plate. For the first time in my life, Dad was intimidating my grandmother, and it was all down to that stupid werewolf bite.

I laid down my fork. “I’m not very hungry.”

“No,” Dad said. “No more moping.”

I stared at him, incredulous. “Look who’s talking!”

“Perdy,” he said warningly.

“Sorry,” I whispered and went back to pushing food around my plate, because I couldn’t swallow past the lump in my throat. If I were obedient, he might soften. If I did what I was told, he might get over whatever stage of depression he was going through.

“You don’t have to be so hard on her,”
Erin
said. “She’s been through a lot, and if her mother—”

“That’s enough!” He slammed his palm on the table, making everything jump and clatter.

Erin
leaned forward, gazing at Dad unfalteringly. “Do
not
speak to me in that tone. Her voice was low, but she was impressively rock steady. “You can’t take it out on us forever, or you might wake up and find yourself alone some day.”

“Maybe that’s what I need,” he said. “Maybe it’s the people I’m surrounded by who—”

Erin
stood abruptly. “Ruth, Perdy, enjoy your evening.”

She turned and left without another word, leaving Gran and me in stunned silence. Dad cleared his throat and stabbed at his food with his fork.

“Dad,” I whispered. “Go after her!”

“For what? She wanted to leave.”

“Did you hear the way you’ve been talking to her? I’m surprised she stuck around this long. If you aren’t an idiot, then run after her. Like, yesterday.”

“Go to your room,” he said without looking at me.

“Gladly. Maybe
you’ll
stop feeling sorry for yourself while I’m gone.” I ran upstairs, and for the next half hour, I could hear Gran and Dad’s argument filter upward. The speed in which everything had gone wrong made me shiver. What I wouldn’t give to go back, to change everything for the better.

***

I headed into the library early again the next morning, eager to get away from my own home. As far as I knew, Dad hadn’t even called
Erin
, and I feared he was wasting his chance with her.

Sick of sneezing, I decided it would be more beneficial for me to dust the library as much as possible to make the air slightly cleaner. After moving things around in the stockroom the day before, I uncovered a stench that had made me fear something had died in there, so it was definitely time for a spring clean.

Mrs. Reed sat at the counter all day, blowing her nose with old-fashioned handkerchiefs, eating chocolates, and reading a doorstopper of a book. She watched me every now and then with little interest. As long as I kept moving, she didn’t seem to care what I did with my time.

The grime clung to my skin, despite my best efforts to clean. I might as well have had a job in a coal mine for the amount of dust clogging up my lungs.

I had my lunch on the steps again, knowing that was about as far as Dad would allow. Before my lunch break ended, Amelia showed up.

“I know you said you couldn’t see me, but this is me seeing you, so you have no choice, so it’s okay,” she said without taking a breath.

“Um, okay?”

“I can stay?”

I thought of Dad. He wouldn’t be happy. “I don’t think that’s a good idea. Dad—”

“Look, I really need to talk to you. It’s about your dad.”

I straightened. “What about him?”

“There’s a lot you need to know. A lot that’s happened. Some of it could help your dad.” She squeezed her eyes shut. “Potentially help your dad. I mean, I don’t know for sure, and I’ll need your help trying to figure it out, but I really think we could do this. Fix it.”

I stared at my shoes, thinking of how unhappy Dad was, how he had essentially driven
Erin
away, how all of those things had happened because of me, and I hadn’t done a thing to fix them. If I had a chance, even the tiniest chance, of helping Dad get back to normal, I would grab it with both hands. It was worth the risk, worth the aggro, worth anything to help him. “Fine. Talk.”

She exhaled loudly and sat next to me. I fought the desire to move away.

“Where to start?” she said, but she sounded excited. “Remember I told you the story of my family, how the curse began and all of that?”

“Yeah…”

“Well, it was all wrong.” She flung out her arms. “Everything! I’m being confusing, sorry. I’ll start at the… remember when I started having those dreams?”

I stared at her. “Of course I remember.”

“Well, they weren’t dreams. They were memories. And when I used the spirit board? We heard from my ancestor, and she was the one who sent me the dreams. The memories, I mean.”

“I’m just confused now.”

“Okay, there was this gypsy girl called Kali, and her father was a chovihano—that’s like a gypsy witch—and she was the seventh daughter of a seventh daughter, so she was a werewolf mother.”

I squinted. “Naturally.”

“Just bear with me. It’ll make sense by the end.” She giggled. “Hopefully, anyhow. So he was this money-grabbing creep who did some kind of black magic deals to make sure he had seven daughters, because the seventh would be worth a fortune. He was training her to be the
chovihani
, so she would be a witch
and
have werewolf children to protect her clan. He wanted her to be as valuable as possible so he could sell her at the highest price.”

She blew out a breath and spoke faster. “But she hated him, didn’t want to be sold to the richest potential husband. She fell in love with a non-gypsy, a gaje, but worse, the guy was married. They ran away, had a baby, her father came looking for her to kill her, and the pair of them cursed each other, which kind of screwed up both curses, and her son was basically my first wolf ancestor.”

“I thought you said the wolf thing was a good thing to them. Valuable, I mean. So why would that be the curse?”

“Yeah, that’s the point. That’s never been the curse. The father of the baby gave the child to his wife to raise before he killed himself.” She made a face. “And the wife lied about the curse because she didn’t want the boy to know she wasn’t his real mother. He wasn’t cursed to be a werewolf, just to be basically, um, obsessed with finding his soul mate. When he did, he would fall too hard, and the soul mate was destined to die, and he was supposed to go mad, pretty much. But now I’ve ended the curse, so…”

I thought about Jakob and Byron and was gripped with the fear that it was too late for Nathan.

“Wait,” I said. “What’s this got to do with my dad?”

“Oh, I didn’t tell you the best bit. So Kali, my ancestor, she was stuck when she died. Like, unable to pass over without passing on her power. She kept trying to communicate with me, and she basically asked me to take it, and I said yeah. That’s what ended the curse.”

“Again, Dad?”

“I have her power. Somewhere. I mean, I don’t know for sure if I can use it or anything, but she wasn’t just a witch, she was a healer, and if I could find out about that kind of power, about gypsy magic, or even just some healing spells, then maybe—”

“You could help my dad.” I thought it over for about ten seconds. “I’m in.”

She grinned. “I knew I could count on you. So we need to research, and well, look where you’re working.”

“Um, it’s not that great in there. Selection-wise, I mean. Lots of old books.”

“But old books are probably the best place to find the answers. We could find something about werewolf legends that might help, or gypsy magic, or anything even remotely similar. We just need a clue, some idea of where to start.”

“What about the spirit board? You said it was Kali who tried to communicate with you before, so why not now?”

She squirmed. “I would rather not do that again, to be honest. At least, not without a bigger group. It wasn’t particularly safe what we did.”

“Gee, thanks.”

“I’m sorry, but it was Kali! She kept influencing me, making me feel things I shouldn’t. Once she left me, I was fine again, but she had gone kind of crazy, and that made me a little off.”

“Crazy like your grandfather,” I said. “Like Byron sometimes. Like… Nathan?”

“Don’t say that,” she said miserably. “Byron’s doing much better now. He’s not as cold as he was. He feels like family now. And Nathan’s just mad at me.”

“But your grandfather?”

She nodded. “He’s not getting any better. He’s still so determined to get revenge.”

“When I saw Nathan, when he came to say goodbye, he was the same. He made it sound like they were out for the kill, like they weren’t coming home without blood on their hands.”

She rubbed the back of her head, a newly formed habit. “If he comes back to us, he’ll be okay. He shouldn’t have left in anger like that. It just made him worse. We can’t rely on him or Opa right now. We have to figure this out ourselves, and hopefully, find a way to fix your dad.”

“Think it’s possible?”

She brightened. “It’s definitely possible. If only Opa would talk to me more, then I could probably piece the things he knows together to help me. I feel as though there’s something locked inside me, and once I have the key, I can really use it to help us all.” She looked away, suddenly sad. “It’s at times like this that I wish Mémère were here. Her family was different, too. She came from psychic women, and Mémère was still into that kind of thing before she met Opa.” She sighed. “So much was lost with her, Perdita.”

I patted her hand. “You’ll be okay.”

She nodded. “I will, just as soon as I figure everything out. Between what Ryan says about the alpha power and what we could do if we can access gypsy magic, maybe we can avoid the whole fight to the death thing, after all.”

“I’m so on board with that. But listen, Dad can’t find out I’ve seen you, okay? He’s taken my phone, and he won’t be Mr. Chirpy if you turn up at the house. Don’t say I didn’t warn you.”

“No problem. I’ll just see you here. Maybe you can help me on your lunch break or something.”

“I can try. Don’t have a clue where to start, but hey, at least we’ll be doing something.”

She smiled “It’s definitely worth a try.”

I thought of Dad.
Anything
was worth a try.

Nathan

I paid the taxi driver with shaky hands and lifted my bag stuffed full of dirty clothes out after me. I stared at our house, at how strange and unwelcoming it looked, and gave a low whistle, but no dogs came running.

Shrugging, I hauled the bag over my shoulder and strolled down the driveway. I couldn’t scent anyone around, and I was kind of glad for it.

I let myself in, dumped my bag in the utility room to deal with later, and headed straight to my room. Ignoring the urge to sleep in a familiar bed, I jumped into the shower, thankful for the hot water. I washed away weeks of travel, strange beds, and frustration under the spray.

The house felt as empty as the hollow part in my chest. I headed into the kitchen to see if I could rummage up anything edible. To my surprise, I found the fridge well-stocked, and I spent a number of minutes pulling out things to make a sandwich. It was nice to eat familiar food again, in my own kitchen, in my own house.