As Anne put the pieces together, her heart began to beat so quickly that she worried it was starting to outpace the steady click of the clock pinned to her chest.
“I’m sorry we kept this from you,” Hester said. “But we wanted to be certain that the source of the trouble rested with Crowley before . . .”
Her sentence trailed away then, leaving in its place a silence so thick that the house nearly pushed out the boundaries of the baseboards by an inch or two.
“We must get to work concealing the effects,” Anne said, trying to calm herself by making a list that could be neatly checked off. “Until things settle down again.”
“That’s the trouble, though,” Nathanial interrupted. “It’s not a minor rip in the fabric of Fate that can be quickly patched together. The whole web will continue to untether until we fix the heart of the problem.”
“What exactly are you suggesting?” Anne asked, gooseflesh rising along her arms.
“We have to complete Mr. Crowley’s Task for him,” Nathanial explained, pointing to the ring that rested on Anne’s finger. “It’s the only way to ensure these events don’t worsen.”
“No,” Anne insisted as she hid the ring from view, just as Mr. Crowley had during the session where his Task had come to light. “We can’t do that.”
If they managed to discover who the ring belonged to and returned it, then Mr. Crowley would no longer be a ghost. He’d pass on to the next phase, leaving Philip behind to struggle on his own. After all the sacrifices that Mr. Crowley had made to ensure they’d be together, it seemed impossible to consider pulling them apart again.
“But we must,” Hester said, surprising Anne with an uncharacteristic softness that smoothed out the edges of her crackling voice. “We know what Crowley wished for, but if we don’t complete his Task, and soon, our world will continue to unravel. The humans have already started to notice, and though they haven’t yet dared put their suspicions into words, it’s only a matter of time before they do. And just think of how many other Tasks might be affected by this change of Fate. How many witches might be forced to linger in between, lost and confused about the path they’ve stumbled onto.”
She was right about the consequences, of course. Now that Anne had opened herself to the possibility, she realized the entire fabric of Fate had been snagged. It was why she’d felt so strange these past few weeks, the reason for that sense of having left something behind and not knowing what needed to be retrieved.
But she still wasn’t certain that the price of pulling everything back together was worth the cost.
“You must focus on finding out who that ring belongs to,” Nathanial said, his steely gaze fixed on Anne. “And soon.”
Anne wanted to ask why she had to be the one to shoulder such a heavy load. How could they think to ask it of her when the distinct scent of chrysanthemums that had always followed Mr. Crowley still clung to his favorite seat in the shop?
But, of course, as the city’s Diviner, that responsibility must fall on her. Who else would be able to see the threads of destiny and ensure that every strand was put back in its proper place?
“You are powerful and strong enough to bare this burden,” Hester murmured, the sound of her voice cutting through the thoughts that were threatening to carry Anne away from the present moment and toward more sinister possibilities that rested in the future. “Our talents will be put to use elsewhere.”
“We’ll solve the problems that arise while you complete Mr. Crowley’s Task,” Nathanial added as he rose from his chair and gestured for Hester and Isaac to follow. “As you can imagine, that will keep us quite busy.”
The other council members would be running about Chicago from morning to night trying to patch up any hint of magical trouble before it became obvious that something was amiss. As the weeks continued to slip by and the force of Mr. Crowley’s remaining Task continued to grow, they’d have to work even harder to keep the worst of their secrets in the dark.
Instead of nodding, though, Anne remained silent, knowing that any agreement she uttered in that moment would carry with it the singed sweetness of a lie.
“I know it is a difficult position, but you must remember your duty,” Hester said as she shifted toward the doorway, her words entangled in a brutal gust of wind that blew past the threshold. “For the city’s sake.”
Anne wrapped her hands around the cold porcelain of her teacup then, her shoulders buckling under an unseen weight, and stared at the hourglass that hovered on the rim while she waited to hear three pairs of footsteps patter on the cobblestones.
But when she realized that she’d only detected the heavy tread of Nathanial’s boots and Hester’s quick steps, Anneglanced up and saw Isaac waiting near the open door, staring both at and through her all at once.
“You’ll find a way,” he finally said in the same tone a sleepwalker might when encountered in the hallway.
“A way to do what?” Anne asked, knowing that when it came to Isaac, nothing was quite as it appeared on the surface.
“To trim off the loose ends,” he replied. “While keeping the whole intact.”
But as Anne listened to Isaac step onto the street and shut the door behind him, she couldn’t help but feel like everything was dangling by a thread. And that if she made a single mistake, the entire fabric of her world would unravel in an instant.
CHAPTER 6
A Key
Suggests that help will come during times of difficulty.
As Beatrix and Violet waited for Anne to join them, they tried their best to savor the familiar embrace of the family parlor. After spending so much time away, tucking themselves in the worn quilts and letting the warmth of the hearth stones sink into their toes made it feel like the house had wrapped its arms around their tired shoulders and pulled them in close. It doted on them as if they were girls again, unveiling a box of chocolates that had been hidden away for safekeeping and encouraging them to settle back on the freshly fluffed cushions of the settee so that their eyelids would grow heavy.
