Banishing the Dark (The Arcadia Bell series) Read Free Page B

coolheaded again, I said, “He knew he could trap me in a binding triangle. And he knew something about the mythology of the Moonchildthat no one has ever hinted at—not anyone in the E∴E∴, not my parents, not any other demons I’ve summoned.”
    A small line formed in the middle of Lon’s brow. “What?”
    “I have all demon knacks.”
    He stared at me, blinking.
    “Every knack. I can command every knack.”
    “Impossible,” he said, but I could hear the doubt in his voice.
    “Think about it,” I said. “I slowed time at Merrimoth’s house. I yanked the transmutation spell out of Yvonne. I transported myself thirty miles through thin air.”
    Lon didn’t say anything for several seconds. “You healed yourself.”
    “What do you mean?”
    “In the hospital. Before Mick left for Australia, he said he’d come in to work on one of your broken bones, and it would already be healed. He said he’d never seen anything like it. He said it was the closest thing to a miracle he’d ever witnessed.”
    That wasn’t good. Never trust a miracle.
    My mind jumped away from my knacks and focused back on the hospital room and the doctor. I vaguely recalled Mick’s face hovering above mine when I was on death’s doorstep. Some strange, hazy memory tried to poke its head above water in the back of my head. Something Mick was trying to tell me. I just couldn’t quite make it out.
    Lon exhaled heavily. “If you really do have the ability—”
    “To wield every knack known to demonkind?” I finished.
    He nodded his head toward this intangible, terrifying thing . “If you do, it would explain a lot. And it would also mean that Dare really did have someone who was investigating you.”
    “Well, we know he already uncovered my real identity.”
    “Identity is one thing, but if Dare hired someone to find out about the Moonchild spell, that’s a whole other matter. Uncovering dark occult secrets isn’t your everyday PI work.”
    “I suppose you’re right.”
    And maybe this investigator opened up my options.
    Priya insisted that the only way to stop my mother was by reversing the Moonchild spell, but heading straight to my order in Florida might not be the right move now that the caliph was gone. And really, besides magical protection, what could my order give me? I’d already scoured its libraries for information about the Moonchild ritual when I was still living there in my teens. And I had to believe that if the caliph knew something about the Moonchild spell, he would have told me.
    My parents’ house in Florida had long been sold, several times, and eventually demolished; new condo buildings stood there now. Nothing I could find thereto help me. I could try to track down people who knew my parents, but they didn’t have friends. So that led me back to the main lodge.
    After I told all this to Lon, I asked, “Am I thinking about this all wrong?”
    “No, you’re not wrong,” he said quietly. “Given everything we now know, I agree that a better tactic would be to track down this investigator.”
    I gave him a tight smile. “Guess I should’ve asked Dare for a name before I killed him.”

No amount of magick or demonic ability could change the past, so there was little use dwelling on what happened with Dare. My mother was the pressing problem. But before Lon and I could piece together a plan of action, a distant door slammed.
    “Sorry, but I can’t hear you!” a voice called out before a sound akin to stampeding buffalos clambered up the stairs. A few moments later, two things lunged through the doorway: a chocolate Lab and a fourteen-year-old boy with a spring-green halo and a pouf of dark corkscrew curls. The sight of him squeezed my heart.
    Jupe skidded to a stop at the foot of the bed. Green eyes blinked at me as he slid his backpack off his shoulders, the straps snagging on monster-movie patches sewn to the sleeves of his Army surplus jacket. “Foxglove!” Jupe protested.
    “Hey, girl,” I