Chương 43: “Lauren Calls Cecile”

The call happened at ten that night, after June was in bed. Vorrath didn't eavesdrop this time. He listened because the call happened in the kitchen directly below June's room and the house was old and the floors were thin and he was a dungeon that had threaded himself through every wall and board and cold draft of this building for eight months and there was no part of it that he could not hear. Lauren said: "Mom, I need you to tell me about the ward." Cecile said something. Lauren said: "All of it."

A long pause on Cecile's end. Then she talked for a while. Vorrath listened. He learned that the ward was not the first thing Cecile's family had made. He learned that there was a history, on Cecile's side, of knowing dormant powers, the inheritance of attention, of people who noticed things and wrote down what they noticed and passed the notes along. He learned that Cecile had three more things in a box under her bed that she had been waiting to know whether to bring.

This narrative has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. If you see it on Amazon, please report it. Lauren said: "Bring them." Cecile said something that made Lauren laugh, short and surprised, the same laugh she used when something was funny and also frightening. Lauren said: "I know. I know it is." A pause.

"She named it, Mom. First thing she did." Cecile said something.

"Yeah," said Lauren.

"That's what I thought too." The call ended. He sat on the windowsill and thought about a box under a bed and three things he didn't know about yet and a family that had been keeping notes across generations about things that needed keeping. He thought: June had not chosen him randomly. He thought: nothing about this had been random. He sat with that for a long time. It was not a comfortable thing to sit with and it was also the best thing he had learned in three thousand years.