A Murder of Magpies (34 page)

My stomach dropped. I covered my face with my hair. “Is this what you and Mom talked
about all those times?”

“Nah. I wanted to command my abilities like Mom. Problem is I don’t have much empathy.
If I move something with my mind, I release my own feelings. I push energy. Vayda,
you pull. It’s why you care so much, why you calm people down and I rile them up.”

So this was why such a blast ignited when Jonah and I joined.

“Why didn’t Mom tell me?” I asked.

He shrugged. “Because she didn’t know what to do with you. You’re a magnet for emotions.
I’m not. I don’t have it in me. Mom created and released, and she was volatile. All
you need is the right catalyst to push as much energy as you pull. Because you can
do both, you are way more like Mom than I could ever dream to be.”

Ward

Until I met Vayda, I’d never been serious about anyone. Hell, anything. For once in
my life, someone wanted me around.

I was losing her.

The kitchen phone rang, distracting me from the caramel popcorn Vayda had mixed up
a while ago, right in time to be hot after I dropped off Bernadette at Heidi’s home.
Vayda listened to the phone, and her voice was snowflake-fragile after the call ended.
“Rain said they’re stuck deciding charges for
Dati
. He mentioned fraud, arson. It’s a mess. He’s getting
Dati
released until he’s formally arrested.”

“
Dati
went off the radar for years,” Jonah grunted as he popped the tab on a can of Coke.
“The cops won’t let him go.”

I raised my brows, silently agreeing with Jonah. Why should Emory be trusted? I doubted
he’d run again, but who knew what a guy would do for his family when cornered?

Vayda touched Jonah’s shoulder. “Rain’s good at what he does. He’ll get
Dati
out.”

After what she’d endured, she still trusted people. I wished I could be like that.

If Drake taught me much of anything, it was, “Don’t fuck up.” Easy to do when my only
model was one mistake after another. Emory? He wasn’t my dad, but he’d shown me a
lot. Yeah, he’d fucked up, but he made the effort my own father never did.

I closed my sketchpad and unzipped my backpack when I noticed the manila folders I’d
stolen from Sister Tremblay’s office. I’d forgotten to hand over the files before
we left Fire Sales.

“I should’ve given this to you sooner,” I said and showed the file to Vayda.

She took a seat. “How’d you get it?”

“I told you I was a delinquent.” I opened her folder. Several newspaper clippings
and photos fluttered in the house’s persistent draft. “But this isn’t really a school
file.”

A picture was clipped to one newspaper article. A family, two teens with braces and
a mother with dark hair grinned at Emory as he put his arm around her. They sat on
the grass during a backyard barbeque. I kept the picture in my hand and scanned the
smudged newspaper clipping.

Riot breaks out after forgette sentencing

Hemlock, GA—Police broke up rioters after a judge announced Lorna Murdock’s sentence
in the Forgette homicide trial. Judge King threw out the conspiracy charge in the
death of June Forgette, citing lack of evidence. King also railed against the prosecution
for “buying into archaic superstitions and rumors of witchcraft,” regarding the assertion
Murdock used psychic powers to force Brett Forgette to shoot himself. King told the
court she would have dismissed the assault charge but agreed that Murdock was involved
in a skirmish with Forgette and sentenced her to forty-eight hours in jail and a small
fine. Murdock’s sentence will begin after the Thanksgiving holiday.

A decided victory for defense lawyer Rain Killian turned into chaos as the gallery
erupted into shouts defaming Murdock as a witch and threw chairs. Killian and Murdock’s
husband Emory, owner of Antiquaria on Poplar Street, shielded her from the crowd as
they left the courthouse. No arrests were made.

Vayda shoved the article across the table and snapped, “Rain’s a good lawyer if nothing
else. She’d been charged with felonies and, because of him, got off scot-free.”

“Scot-free. Yeah, right,” Jonah muttered and sulked out of the kitchen, the slam of
the door to Emory’s office shaking the bones of the house.

Vayda took a deep breath and fanned herself. “Whenever he’s mad, all this heat pours
out of him.”

So I’d noticed.

She flipped through the rest of the articles in the folder, an obsessive collection
of every mention of the Murdocks in print—Emory’s articles in antiques magazines,
published lists with her and Jonah’s names for their school’s honor roll, tons of
articles about Lorna’s trial.

She closed the folder. “Thanks. For standing with us.”

I touched her cheek. “I don’t scare easily.”

I kissed her before she had the chance to speak. The last say was mine this time.

***

Sister Tremblay’s hospital room was one floor below the one where Jonah had stayed
after Marty attacked him. Second time Marty Pifkin had put someone in the ICU. At
least now he was in lock-up.

I stood in the doorway of Sister Tremblay’s room. Coils of dark hair spread out on
her pillow. Her upper lip stitched together, and the skin on her cheek was a mess
of shiny purple, handprints visible on her neck. I passed the Shirley Jackson book
I’d grabbed in the gift shop from one hand to the other. Maybe I should leave, let
her recover before asking questions. By the time she was released, Vayda could be
gone, Emory locked away.

“Go away, Ward,” her voice rasped.

“I brought you this,” I said and set the book on a table by her bed. “I need to talk
to you about the Silvers.”

“You mean the Murdocks.”

I pulled up a chair by her bed and counted the mountains on the screen of the heart
monitor. Nothing changed her pulse. Nothing surprised her even in her battered state.

“The Murdocks,” I repeated. “Yeah.”

Sister Tremblay licked her cracked lips. “Stay away from them. It’s for the best.”

I coughed, the rattling in my chest refusing to let go of its grip on me, and Sister
Tremblay lifted a weak hand toward the pitcher of ice water and two cups on her bedside
table. I poured myself a drink and waited until my cough eased up. “You know I can’t
stay away. Vayda needs help, Sister. I know you’re here to help. I want to help, too.”

“Then be prepared for the consequences. How long have you had that cough, Ward?”

“A long time,” I answered. “It’s not contagious if that’s what you’re worried about.”

“The doctors don’t know why you have it, do they? Has Vayda ever said why she enjoys
being around you?”

Clearly, it was my sparkling personality.

“Do you give her peace?” Sister Tremblay pressed on. She waited, and when I didn’t
answer, she asked, “Do nearly all your thoughts and feelings stay your own and not
invade hers unless you want her to know?”

“It’s how we are together,” I said. “And I’m not going to talk with you about why
I’m with Vayda.”

She studied my face with sad eyes. “You need to know there’s more than you think.
There’s a word for people like you. Conduits. You have the ability to safely let the
energy inside her come out.”

“A lightning rod,” I said.

She gave a slow nod. “Lightning rods are nearly impenetrable, but if they’re not properly
grounded, they’ll corrode with time. They fail. The more you are with her, Ward, the
worse the effects of all that energy passing through you will become.”

The hair on the back of my neck stood on end, and this time Vayda hadn’t caused it.
My mouth went dry. When I was with her, my cough was worse. My lungs were tighter.

“Every empath eventually wills someone into becoming a conduit to make their lives
more bearable. It sounds selfish, but most of the time, they don’t even realize they’ve
done it. They only know they need that person. For the conduit, the repeated exposure
to energy and emotion finds a weakness and feeds on it. It is a danger of being a
conduit. Wherever you are weakest, that’s where the damage will have the greatest
impact. For some, it preys on the mind or heart. Mental illness. Blocking arteries.
For you, it is your breathing.”

Vayda damaged me. She had no idea what she’d done, how destructive she was.

There had to be a way to lessen the toll. If there wasn’t, was it possible I’d die?

“Wait a second,” I argued. “I’m not the only person who can block Vayda. Her dad—”

“—isn’t a conduit,” Sister Tremblay interrupted. “Emory has merely become very skilled
at deflecting anyone who pries into his mind or emotions. He had lots of practice,
considering his wife. Lorna had another conduit.”

My limbs felt heavy, the weight of everything Sister Tremblay had said slogging through
my veins. I slouched in the chair. Muted. Stunned. How could I tell Vayda about my
being a conduit? She already didn’t accept what she was. She’d never forgive herself.

She would destroy me if I stayed with her.

I could take it. Or I prayed I could.

“You want to help Vayda and Jonah learn to control their abilities,” I said. “Can’t
you help us figure out this conduit shit?”

The spikes in her pulse quickened. “I can’t. Getting involved with them anymore…I
can’t.”

“Sister, please.” I was begging, didn’t care that she was scared. “With Emory being
questioned by the police, they need help. You promised him.”

She backed into her pillow, but there was no place to hide. “That was before. Helping
them can get people killed. I’m sorry, Ward.”

“So what changed your mind?” I demanded. “I know Marty attacked you, but you’re the
only person in Black Orchard who knows what they are, who could help them. Please!”

“Marty?” Her forehead puzzled, and she drew her hand up to the bruises on her throat.
“He didn’t do this.”

If it wasn’t Marty…I had to take a deep breath. “Who did?”

She shuddered, and then a strange cry leaked between her lips, one sick, wounded,
and terrified. “Like I said, Lorna had a different conduit. Someone close to her.
Someone who loved her but couldn’t be with her. Someone whose mind she wrecked.”

I rose to my feet, the name already in my mind as I backed toward the door.

“Rain Killian.”

***

I parked the Chevy in front of the Silvers’ house and fished a cough drop from my
coat pocket.

How could I tell Vayda? She’d never trust in anything, anyone again.

I didn’t want her to be like me, broken beyond repair.

I spat the cough drop back into its wrapper, and despite the heaviness in my shoulders,
I charged up the front steps of the house in the woods and flung open the front door.
Neither she nor Jonah was in the living room or the study. They weren’t in the kitchen,
and it wasn’t until I went up the stairs and found the attic ladder pulled down that
I guessed where they were. Moving so fast my chest heaved, I climbed the stairs to
the attic, intent on getting out what Sister Tremblay had told me, but I froze once
I pulled my body up through the opening.

A bare light bulb glimmered too brightly against the sharp angles of the roof. Most
of the room was unfinished wood coated with dust. Some old trunks, a couch that had
to be at least two decades old, and a dressmaker’s mannequin were all neatly tucked
against one side. Vayda held an electrical cord. Identical wires ran up and down the
length of the attic, feeding into the corners. Jonah had barely enough room to stand
without ducking his head.

“What are you guys doing?” I asked.

“I’ve been hearing sounds for a while,” Vayda admitted. “I thought it was birds and
came up here to check it out.”

I took some of the electrical cord, following the odd map where it tacked to the floor
until I reached the corner. With a bit of fidgeting, I unearthed a camera set to peer
down into the upstairs hallway. Other cameras were situated along the bedrooms, the
stairway, and if I had to guess, most of the house was rigged.

“That’s one hell of a security system on the house,” I remarked. “Isn’t it a little
overkill to have cameras inside?”

“We don’t have a security system,” Jonah answered.

There were footprints in the dust, fresh footprints where the tread didn’t match my
boots or the soles of Jonah and Vayda’s sneakers. Someone had been in the attic recently.
“Vayda, how’d you guys wind up with this house?”

“It was Rain’s,” she answered. “He’s owned it for years and said we’d be safe here
after Mom died.”

Oh, God
. My chest ached. I threw down the electrical cord. “How many times have you told
me you always feel like you’re being watched? If you don’t have a security system,
who sees the feed from these cameras? Who could? Last night, when your dad said to
call Rain, did you call him at home or on a cell phone?”

“What? Why? That doesn’t make any difference. I called his cell phone because no one
answered at his number in Hemlock. What’s going on? You’re freaking out.”

Panic rose up my gut. I wanted nothing more than to get her and Jonah out of that
house, get them somewhere safe, but they had to understand why. “No one answered in
Hemlock because Rain was already here. How do you think he got to town so quickly?
Marty had nothing to do with what happened to Sister Tremblay. It was Rain.”

“That’s insane,” Jonah retorted. “He wouldn’t do that. He’s our godfather.”

I put Vayda’s hands on the sides of my face. She was scared, and I hated being the
person frightening her. I wasn’t losing it. I knew exactly what was going on, but
how to get her and Jonah to believe me? “Sister Tremblay told me everything. Read
me. Get in my head. See if I’m making this up.”

Shaking as our eyes locked, I felt mine dilate, opening wider to let her into my mind
when a car door slammed outside. All three of us rushed to an octagon-shaped window
where sunlight streamed into attic, lighting up every particle of dust in the air.