Tarot Academy 4 - Sarah Piper Page 0,4

he’ll know the difference.”

My hand hovers behind her head, the faintest brush of her wild hair tickling my palm.

But she has returned to her task.

As I must return to mine.

Stevie drags the stick across the grater, the rich spice hitting my nose again.

But the fantasy of home and contentment has shattered.

I turn away from her and head toward the basement.

“Stay out of the bedroom,” I call over my shoulder. “They don’t want us interrupting their magick.”

Stevie says nothing.

Gripping Kate’s potion, I step onto the basement landing and pull the door shut behind me, welcoming the cold, dark embrace. Grateful for it.

Here, in the absence of light, no one can see the tears.

Three

CASS

By memory more than sight, I make my way down the stairs and across the cold chamber to the cots where we’ve kept our guests. The only light comes from the moon shining through the small, high windows around the perimeter, most of which are covered from the outside with tumbleweeds. It takes a long moment for my eyes to adjust. To pick out the shapes from the shadows.

Janelle lies on her side, facing away from me, her breathing deep and even. She’s either asleep or unconscious—or possibly full of shit, just waiting for an opportunity to pounce.

But the cot adjacent to hers is empty, the sheets kicked to the ground.

I make my way around the room, but other than the cots, chairs, and tables we set up this week, there’s little else here. No place to hide.

Casey is gone.

I press my hand to the mattress—still indented with the shape of her body, still slightly warm. She must’ve snuck away while we were all still in the bedroom. Apparently, she came through the post-possession effects of the binding spell on her own, no sedative or guided meditation needed.

On her pillow, I find a hastily scrawled note, barely legible in the darkness.

“Fuck.”

“Baz?” Janelle says, her voice weak and watery as she rolls over and peers up at me, attempting to identify me through heavily-lidded eyes. “Is that you, sweetness?”

My stomach churns at the saccharine dripping from her voice. I can only imagine why she’s calling for Baz at a time like this.

I shove Casey’s note in my pocket.

“Guess again,” I whisper, looking for a reason to make her suffer. A reason to make anyone suffer for what’s happening to Ani. To Stevie. To all of us.

She played a part in this. She’s still playing a part, throwing her cards in with the Dark Arcana who’d just as soon snuff us out. And while my esteemed colleagues upstairs might have a hard limit against torturing this parasite, I’ve got no such scruples.

And the kind, compassionate professors who might’ve stopped me from pushing this too far are nowhere in sight.

Nowhere in screaming distance.

They’re too busy trying to bring our beautiful ginger-haired brother back from the brink of insanity.

Deep in my chest, a new feeling unfurls. Dark. Hungry. Filling up the empty spaces inside me like a slow, creeping fog.

You know what to do, Cassius, the old voice echoes. Just like before.

I glance at Kate’s sedative potion in my hand, but no, this red-gold brew isn’t going to do the trick tonight. I set it on the worktable and glance over the tools and ingredients still on display from our first few nights here.

Kate may be the Academy’s unparalleled expert at healing potions.

But me? I’m quite adept at the other kind.

And sometimes, the other kind is the best remedy. The true remedy.

The cost.

“How are we feeling tonight, Janelle?” I ask, unbuttoning my cuffs and rolling up my sleeves. My voice is so cold and detached, I hardly recognize it.

“Better now that you’re here.” She tries to sit up on the cot, but the last vestiges of the binding spell hang heavy, and she falls right back again. “So… tired.”

“Yes, I can imagine. I understand you’ve had quite an adventure with Professor Phaines.”

“I did it for you, Baz,” she says, not an ounce of regret in her watery voice. “So we could be together.”

Bile rises in my throat. What kind of sick, twisted things are playing out in her mind?

No matter. It’s only going to get worse for her tonight.

I turn back to the worktable and make my selections, carefully measuring ingredients into an empty glass bottle. It’s been decades since I made this particular potion, but I’ll never forget the recipe: a precise blend of Demon’s Blood resin, Witch’s Cauldron, Black Moonstone elixir, Essence of Poppy, rattlesnake venom, and Fairy’s Breath, the last