“No kidding?” Mags piped up. “Ten years older?”
“I think that’s illegal,” Evan whispered.
“Not illegal. Lola’d be eighteen,” Penelope said.
“Oh.”
“Whoop dee doo dah,” Lola said.
“He seemed nice, though,” Penelope added, with an excess of cheer. “Interesting, too. Passionate about what he does. Could be thirty eight or forty eight.”
“Sure,” Lola said. “Nice, interesting, into his work. Not that old. But he could want different things than I want, and because he’s buying me, he gets the final say. I don’t want kids? Too bad. I want to go to school or have a career? Too bad.”
“I’m sorry,” I said.
Lola shot me a smile, but there was an anger in her eyes, surrounded by the startling crimson eyeshadow. It was as if I’d angered her just by inviting her to talk about the subject. “Things change, Blake. If the Duchamps come out on top, and we’re most definitely a contender, then the marriage thing can stop. Or they can at least slow down, make it volunteer-only. My fiancé is coming into town with his brothers. He’s helping. And so long as I play along, we’ve got that tiny bit of extra psychopomp firepower. We can help Sandra take over, and help the status quo change.”
“For the next generation?” I asked.
“Or the rest of this generation,” Lola said, glancing at Penelope. When she looked back my way, Lola’s body language was stubborn, her jaw set.
“You don’t have to do that,” Penelope said.
“No I don’t,” Lola said. “But I can look at our options, weigh things in one hand versus the other. Doing this, playing along, it’s a safer, stronger bet than the other options I’ve debated so far.”
“I wonder,” I said, “If your mom thought the same thing. Or if Sandra convinced herself she could change it all.”
“They could’ve. They’re could be working on it as we speak, attacking your friends at the house and working to put Sandra in her seat as Lord of Jacob’s Bell,” Lola said.
“Or maybe,” I replied, “Things will keep going the way they’ve gone for generations. You might end up making peace with the fact that Penelope gets married off, because there wasn’t enough time. Then Penelope’s younger sister could end up getting married off. You can still convince yourself that it’s fine, that it takes time. What happens after? You end up having a kid with the psycho, and one day you could wind up using the same tricks on your daughter that your mother and aunts used to manipulate you?”
I could see Lola’s expression harden, the muscles at the corners of her jaw standing out, any softness disappearing.
I waited, inviting her to speak, but there was only hardness. “…Maybe you wind up convincing her that if she just plays along, she won’t have to do the same for her daughter?”
“You really aren’t interested in making friends,” Mags commented.
“I want people to look!” I said, and I raised my voice a little too much. I was anxious, in my odd, inhuman new way of being anxious, and having them fight me on this very preliminary front was only making it worse. “I want you to god-damn think! Why the hell would the Duchamps stop doing what they’re doing, just because they were a little more powerful? Power has to be secured. They’re not going to abandon the methods that got them status and power in the first place. They’re going to keep doing it, only they’ll escalate. Reach out to practitioners who are further away. Use their new position to build something.”
“No,” Lola said. “I know Sandra. I know… some general stuff about her. I’m sure she wouldn’t escalate.”
“The priest?” I asked.
Lola raised one eyebrow, but she didn’t reply.
“You heard something when Hillsglade House was smote?” Penelope asked.
“I don’t have much of a fricking clue what happened with Sandra and him,” I said. “All I know is that right now, it’s looking like a pretty raw deal for Lola here, for the Behaims, and even for Penelope. It’s a raw deal for me.”
“Me too,” Evan chimed in. “Not me, exactly, but an awful lot of people I like are part of this. I want this to go okay for them.”
“Things change,” Lola said, with a note of certainty in her voice.
Stubborn. I was a little surprised that a Duchamp would be like that, that someone from the subtle and creative enchantresses would be so blunt in attitude. I supposed it had to do with where she’d come from. She’d carved out a bit of individuality among a sea of cousins and sisters who all looked and acted very similar to one another.
That stubbornness, though, was something of a wall for me. I couldn’t push forward so long as she kept giving me the same answer.
“We’re the only ones who can change the course of all this,” I said. “You guys, as representatives or whatever you are to your families, you’re in a position to spread the word, make arguments. If you don’t like the current status quo, fight it.”
“At the worst possible moment?” Craig asked. “We’d weaken our families just in time for Johannes to swoop in and seize the lordship.”
Lola commented, “The Behaims aren’t in a position to get the lordship anyway.”
“No comment,” Craig said. “Whether we were or weren’t, we’d be betraying our family.”
“Oh, I’m not saying Blake is right,” Lola said. “I’m saying you’re weak.”
This wasn’t what I’d hoped for. Maybe if I’d had a larger group to work with, I could have convinced the younger ones. Joanna, Penelope’s younger sister, might have been more inclined to listen.
I’d wanted them to realize just how much they were slaves to their bloodline’s traditions. But they were on the cusp of adulthood, already settling into their individual responsibilities. Craig, Ainsley and Gavin had been trusted to go to Toronto to help Laird and Duncan fight. Lola was getting married. Penelope had at least had enough leverage to call off the Duchamps when I’d returned Letita to her and her sister. She’d gotten in trouble, but she’d had a voice.
Maybe, if I’d been able to reach the ones without a voice, I could have done something.
Fuck.
The Briar Girl spoke. “You told me I might be interested in this.”
“Yeah,” I said.
“What do I have to gain?”
It dawned on me that she’d forgotten our prior conversation.
“When the Thorburns fall,” I said, “The glades that give Hillsglade House its name will probably be cut down, the marshes will be drained. You’re… very similar to me, in a way.”
“Similar?”
“Swept up in the tide. More at the mercy of the individual families than any of the others, who have cabals or covens or circles to protect them. If and when the Thorburns lose, you lose, very probably.”
“If the Thorburns win, I lose. After the priest left the house, we all heard about what Rose did. There’s a working with a demon, protecting her. We can’t touch her. Nobody wins when there are demons involved.”