THERE HAD TO BE ANOTHER SIDE TO THE STORY. GWEN wasn’t interested in speculating about what it might be. As far as she was concerned, our aunt was a brutal killer who’d murdered a young girl’s first love. The set of Gwen’s jaw, the absolute certainty in her voice—her mind held zero doubt about that night.
No, I thought, sitting on the train back to Boston, there must be more to it. I knew my aunt. Gwen’s picture of her as a cruel butcher killing for spite simply wasn’t her. Mab had once reminded me that I didn’t know everything about her. But one thing I did know: She’d never do what Gwen accused her of. Mab was loved and respected by the villagers of Rhydgoch. She didn’t go around slaughtering them.
She killed him in cold blood, Vicky. A fifteen-year-old boy. And all because he tried to kiss me.
Yet Gwen’s words haunted me all the way home.
WHEN I WALKED IN MY FRONT DOOR, MAB LOOKED UP from the book she was reading. Kane came over and sniffed at my fingers, wagging his tail.
“You had a telephone message—” Mab began.
“I need to talk to you. Right now.” My voice sounded harsh as I gestured toward the bedroom.
“The caller did say it was important.”
“So is this.”
Mab didn’t argue. She stood slowly, her brow creased as she peered at me. She balanced her book on the arm of the chair and walked around the sofa to the bedroom.
Kane tilted his head, curious.
“I’m not trying to shut you out, but I need to talk to my aunt in private. It’s a family matter.”
He pressed against my leg, like he wanted to show his support, then went into the kitchen.
Mab sat straight-backed on the edge of my bed, hands folded in her lap. She kept her face blank, waiting.
I closed the door and leaned back against it. “Mab . . .” On the ride back from Needham, I’d imagined a dozen different scenarios of how I’d handle this conversation: a confrontation, a gentle question, a matter-of-fact request for her explanation. Now, it was hard just to get the words out. Gwen’s story, so vivid when she told it, dimmed, and suddenly I wanted to say never mind, it was a mistake, forget the whole thing. The idea of Mab as a murderer was preposterous. But I needed to know the truth. I blurted, “Gwen told me you killed someone in front of her. A village boy named Eric.”
Mab closed her eyes as if in pain. But then she nodded, once, and I had the feeling she’d expected my words. “Yes, I thought she might bring that up now. To enlist your help in keeping me away from Maria, I’d wager.” She opened her eyes and regarded me calmly. No hint of guilt troubled her gaze. “Frankly, I’m surprised she’s waited this long. She never told you before?”
“Don’t you think I’d have asked you about it if she had? I’m asking now. I need to hear your side of the story.”
“Well, your sister told you the truth. During the brief period of her apprenticeship, I became aware she was sneaking out of the house at night. I followed her, I saw her meet a boy. And I slashed his throat.”
She looked at me fiercely, almost defiantly, challenging me to judge her acts. I put my hands behind me to hide their shaking, but I waited. There had to be more coming, and I was keeping my judgment—and my emotions—in check until I knew the whole story.
“There was no village boy, Victory. It was Pryce.”
“Pryce?” The demi-demon who’d loosed the Morfran on Boston and tried to kill me had once upon a time courted my sister?
She nodded. “He somehow learned my niece had come to Wales to train with me, and his first thought was of the prophecy. He wanted to find out whether this young American niece was the Victory foretold in The Book of Utter Darkness.”
The Book of Utter Darkness was an ancient text, written in the language of Hell, that outlined the origin of demons and was full of slippery prophecies about the struggle between the Cerddorion and demonkind. Pryce had attempted to use the book as his personal road map to power, believing that “Victory,” mentioned in the book, was destined to be his mate and demon queen. In the end, though, his arrogance had caused him to misinterpret the prophecies and end up as he was now, “the sleeper.”
Mab continued: “Pryce altered his human appearance to that of a teenage boy.” Demi-demons can’t shift into animals, but they can take on whatever human shape they choose. “In that guise, he courted Gwen. It didn’t take him long to learn that she had a sister named Victory and to decide that you, not she, were the one foretold. Gwen was of no interest to him; he could have simply walked away. It would have broken the child’s heart—she was a silly, romantic girl—but Pryce saw an opportunity to injure me through her. He intended to kill her.”
I knew Pryce. I could believe it. But still I felt my jaw drop as I stared at my aunt.
“It’s fortunate I chose that night to follow her. At first, he looked like a human boy to me, as well. I almost went home, thinking I’d simply keep the girl too busy to sneak out. But when Gwen closed her eyes and leaned forward for her first kiss, Pryce pulled a dagger. Moonlight glinted off the blade. His shadow demon loomed behind him, and I realized who he was. I drew my own dagger and ran over to them; I swear I never moved so fast in this lifetime. I grabbed Pryce’s hair, yanked his head back, and slit his throat.” Her face showed grim satisfaction. “My only regret is that the blade wasn’t bronze. I could have destroyed that infernal demi-demon once and for all.”
Her fists were clenched. She opened her fingers and smoothed out her skirt.
“Poor Gwen,” she said. “All she saw was a mortally wounded boy. The look of utter horror in her eyes . . . I knew I’d lost her then. She ran back to Maenllyd and locked herself in her room. The moment she fled, Pryce disappeared into the demon plane to heal. Gwen didn’t see that, of course. He returned moments later in his demon form—at a safe distance, I might add—and announced he’d be waiting for you.”
No wonder Mab had kept such a tight leash on me for all those years of my apprenticeship. I never once went into the village alone, and my training left little time for walks through the woods and fields. Village boys? I never knew they existed.
Would I have been susceptible to Pryce’s charms at that age? I was glad I’d never had the chance to find out.
“Gwen wouldn’t open her door or listen to me. Over and over, she demanded to return home. That’s all she would say. And so I sent her home.”
Mab stood. “Your sister did see what she believes she saw: She saw the boy’s slashed throat, felt his blood on her arms and face. Yet she’ll never believe the rest. She wouldn’t listen to me. She didn’t believe the village constable, who said there was no such boy in Rhydgoch. She didn’t believe your father, who tried to tell her about demi-demons.” Mab sighed. “And should you try to explain, she won’t believe you, either. I concluded twenty years ago that Gwen was lost to me. Her recent actions confirm that. I’m afraid there’s nothing anyone can do about it.”
And that was that. Mab moved toward me. I stepped aside to let her pass. She opened the door and went into the living room, saying over her shoulder, “You need to return that phone call. It was from a Detective Costello, and he said it was urgent.” She picked up her book and resumed reading.
Kane’s face appeared in the kitchen doorway. “We’re good,” I told him. “Everything’s fine.” But nothing felt fine. My heart ached for Gwen, who for twenty years had been forced to carry a ghastly secret because no one would believe her. And for Mab, branded a murderer by the niece whose life she’d saved, shut out of Gwen’s life, her family. There ought to be something I could do to bridge the chasm between them. But they’d lived on their opposite sides of that chasm for twenty years. The tragedy of the situation was fresh to me; it had long ago been woven into the fabric of their lives.