I glance over at him. “Ran away from what?”
“From who, ” he says, pushing a hand roughly through his hair. “She got involved with a bad bloke. My parents reckoned she left the country to hide from him.”
“Christ,” I say. “He must have been terrible, if she had to run away from the whole World of Mages.”
Jamie’s squinting out the window. “My mum doesn’t like us to talk about it…”
“Sure,” I say, “I understand.”
“… because it was the Mage.”
I turn my whole head towards him, then whip my eyes back onto the road.
“The Mage?”
“Uh-huh.”
“Your sister dated the Mage?”
“They met at school.”
“I didn’t know the Mage dated…”
“My parents hated him.” Jamie’s voice is flat. This is all old news for him. “They thought he was a nutter. My mum wanted to send Lucy to Switzerland to get away from him.”
“What’s in Switzerland?”
“I still don’t know. Anyway, Lucy didn’t listen. She and Davy ran off after Watford—maybe they got married. Whatever happened, it wasn’t good. She used to write my mum these letters…” He trails off. I give him a moment to go on, but he doesn’t.
“And then what?”
He shrugs. “Then she stopped writing. She disappeared.”
I can’t wrap my head around this. Not even a little. “What did the Mage say about that?”
“Not much. He blamed my parents for Lucy leaving him. My dad wanted to challenge him to a duel. My mum was beside herself.”
“You don’t think…” I rearrange my hands on the steering wheel. “I mean, you don’t think he…”
Jamie looks at his lap. “My mum believes Lucy’s alive. You’ve seen the candle.”
“Right,” I say. “Cor. No wonder Lady Ruth hates the Mage.”
“She practically threw a party when you killed him. I think she would have sent you roses if she knew how to get them to you.”
We’re both quiet.
“I suppose I have to tell my mum that I lost my magic,” Jamie says after a while.
“I think she’s just gonna be so relieved to see you.”
“I still can’t believe she sent Simon Snow after me…”
“It’s kind of a long story—the Coven thought you’d been murdered by vampires.”
“Vampires?” He laughs. “Imagine.”
When we get to Lady Ruth’s house, Jamie tries to get me to come up to the house with him—but it doesn’t feel right. I stay in the van. （I’m going to abandon it a few blocks from here.） I watch him walk up to the big front door. I can see the candles burning in the upper window.
Jamie knocks. And after a few minutes, Lady Ruth comes to the door. She looks shocked to see him. He hugs her. I think she might be crying.
They go inside, and the door closes.
81
BAZ
It’s an hour-long drive to Oxford. My stepmother cries intermittently for the first half hour, then goes pale and wrings her hands for the second. I think she would have turned back if she were the one driving.
When we get to the hunting lodge, I pull the car right up to the house and turn off the engine. She shows no sign of getting out, so neither do I. I tap the steering wheel and look up at the door.
Daphne and I don’t talk about things. Not usually. Not really.
She’ll ask me how university is going, and I’ll tell her, and then she’ll say, “Good show, Basilton. You make your father so proud.” She used to ask for my help with the girls—but never in a badgering way. She used to take me shopping for summer clothes and sports gear.
I never rebelled against my father’s remarriage. I just went to Watford and got over it. I got used to Daphne. Things got better after she moved in. （Even though she’s the reason my aunt moved out.）
My father got very hard when my mother died—perhaps he was always hard, I don’t know—but Daphne softens him. She’s the reason I got a mobile phone when I turned 15. And the reason I got to go on school trips. And probably the reason my father didn’t murder Simon after our ancestral home lost its magic.
She’s a good person. A good stepmother.
“They’re going to be happy to see you,” I say softly.
She laughs, joylessly. Some of the tears come back. “How am I going to explain this…”