Any Way the Wind Blows Read online

  I climb into the practically nonexistent back seat of her MG (1967, Grampian Grey—classic), which Fiona treats as carelessly as everything else in her life. (You should see our flat; there are mice living in the sofa, it’s shambolic.) I have to sit sideways to fit. I wrench my knees past the seat in front of me. “Are you going to tell me what you were doing at Watford?”

  Fiona starts the car. “I needed to pick something up.”

  “In Headmistress Bunce’s rooms?”

  She glares at me in the rearview mirror. “Those are your mother’s rooms, Basil.”

  “No. Not anymore.”

  “Always.”

  “Fiona. The Mage is dead. The war is over.”

  “That’s what they’d have you think.”

  “That’s what I do think.”

  “The war isn’t over until we get back what’s ours!”

  “What’s ours, Fiona?”

  “Our power, Baz! Watford! The Coven!”

  “The Coven has already rolled back most of the Mage’s reforms. What more do you want?”

  “They were never reforms!” She points at me in the mirror. “They were a campaign against the Old Families!”

  “Well, they’re mostly gone now, is my point.”

  “It’s too little, too late.”

  “Fine then,” I say, “maybe you should run for the Coven and change things.” (This is a terrible idea, I’d never vote for Fiona. And I can vote now—the injunction against my family was dropped. All the Mage’s laws targeting specific families were overturned. We’ve got Bunce’s mother to thank for that.)

  “In the old days,” Fiona pouts, “Pitches didn’t have to run. We were guaranteed three spots on the Coven.”

  How am I supposed to reply to that? The woman is ridiculous. I roll my eyes and try to change the subject. “What were you trying to find at Watford?” I ask again, more gently this time.

  She shakes her head. “Something of your mother’s.”

  “Headmistress Bunce said there’s nothing of my mother’s left at Watford. She already gave me all of her books.”

  “Then why are they still on the shelves in Bunce’s office?”

  “That was my decision. I thought Mum would want them to stay at Watford.”

  “How do you know what she’d want?” Fiona scoffs. “You never even knew her.”

  I sit back. Away from my aunt.

  Her eyes jump up to the mirror. “Fuck. Basil. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean that. I’m just—I haven’t had a cigarette in three days.”

  And she isn’t having one now. Fiona isn’t allowed to smoke in the car with me; I don’t trust her with fire in close quarters. I look out the window, ignoring her.

  “Basil. Don’t pout.”

  “What were you looking for?” I ask again. Less gently.

  “Nothing.” She’s holding the steering wheel too tight. “Something I need. Something I know Natasha would give me.”

  “You need to leave it be. If they catch you at Watford again, they’ll lock you up without a trial.”

  “I’ll go back to Watford when I please—I’m an alumnus! The observatory is named after me!”

  “The observatory is named after your grandfather.”

  “So were you, boyo. It’s Pitch blood in both our veins.”

  It’s rat blood in my veins. Currently. I ducked into an alley and fuelled up as soon as I got back into town.

  “Stay out of trouble, Fiona. You’ll drag me down with you. And that’s the last thing my mother would want—I know enough to know that.”

  5

  PENELOPE

  My mother didn’t seem too upset when I called her from America. She was so happy to hear that I’d broken up with Micah—and so eager to complain to me about Fiona Pitch—that there wasn’t really time to tell her the whole story …

  All right, I swear I’m going to tell her about the vampires and Las Vegas and definitely the NowNext. I just need to figure out a way to do it that won’t get us all dragged before the Coven.

  I can’t overstate how many laws we’ve broken in the last week.

  Theft, more theft, counterfeiting. Flagrant misuse of magic. Criminal indiscretion. Manipulating Normals, exploiting Normals, exposing Normals to magickal secrets.

  Exposing one particular Normal to all of the above.

  Maybe I shouldn’t have brought Shepard to England; he’d be the most valuable witness in a case against us.

  But I couldn’t just leave him as he was. He risked his life to help us in America, knowing that he’d go straight to hell if the risk didn’t pay off. I wouldn’t abandon anyone who was trapped by a demon.

  And Shepard, much that I regret meeting him, isn’t just anyone. He saved my life in the desert. And Agatha’s, too. We were about ten seconds away from Joan-of-Arc territory when he intervened.

  We take the Tube to my parents’ house. Shepard talks too loud and points at everything. “Londoners don’t talk on the Underground,” I tell him.

  “But I’m not from London,” he replies.

  I haven’t asked him much about his demon problem yet. I want Mum and Dad to hear the whole story. I know for certain that Mum’s done a course in demonology, and Dad knows a lot about magickal law; it was part of his linguistics training.

  I’ve only got the usual demon training: Don’t talk to them. Don’t take sweets from them. Never, ever get in their vans.

  It’s not usually a danger. Demons don’t just show up—they have to be summoned.

  “All right,” I say, when we’re off the Tube and walking down my street, “we’re almost there. Remember, you promised not to ask impertinent questions.”

  “I remember.”

  “Maybe just don’t ask any questions—I don’t trust you to judge what’s pertinent.”

  “Do you have to cast a spell to reveal it?” he asks.

  “To reveal pertinence?”

  “No, your house—is it magickally hidden?”

  I can feel the disdain on my face. “How would we get our mail if our house was magickally hidden?”

  “So, you just … walk in?”

  “Well”—I turn up the path to our house—“I have to use a key.”

  Shepard frowns up at the brick two-storey. It’s painted light blue, and my dad’s planted hydrangeas out front.

  “Magicians don’t all live in caves and castles,” I say. “Sorry to disappoint you.”

  “Do any magicians live in caves and castles?”

  “This is what I mean about impertinent questions.”

  I open the door and let him in. The house is a mess; it’s always a mess. Too many people live here, too many people with too many things, and nobody cares overly much about cleaning. Both my parents work long hours—though that’s shifted some recently. With the Mage gone, Mum took over the headmaster’s post at Watford. And with the Humdrum gone, my dad’s work on magickal dead spots is less critical. He’s spending less time in his lab and more time managing my siblings.

  I have three brothers and one sister, and they’re all home for the summer. Premal, the oldest, moved back home a year and a half ago, when the Mage’s Men were disbanded. Premal still doesn’t have a job, and he hasn’t started university, but Mum won’t let anyone mention it.

  After the news broke—that the Mage was a power-mad murderer—one of the other Mage’s Men, a boy from Premal’s year, tried to kill himself. No one in our house is allowed to mention that either.

  I give Shepard a hard once-over before we walk into the living room, as if some last-minute adjustment will make him less Normal. Shepard looks like he’s looked every other day since we met: tall and lanky, long face, bright eyes. He’s Black, with hair that’s two inches tall on top but shaved close over his ears. He wears John Lennon glasses and corduroy trousers. (We picked up extra clothes for him at the airport, and somehow he managed to find more corduroy trousers.)

  I’ve only seen Shepard without his denim jacket once, the day he showed me his curse
tattoos. The jacket’s unbelievably naff, covered in badges that say things like THE TRUTH IS OUT THERE and SOMEWHERE, SOMETHING INCREDIBLE IS WAITING TO BE KNOWN. Honestly, he looks like a complete nerd, but that, at least, won’t be a problem in my house.

  “What?” he whispers.

  “What,” I whisper back.

  “You look like you’re trying to find something wrong with me.”

  “I am.”

  “Parents like me,” he says. (Smug.)

  “My mum won’t.”

  “Is she racist?”

  “What? No! I’m biracial.”

  Shepard shrugs.

  “She’s not racist,” I say. “She just doesn’t like people. Fortunately, you’re interesting.”

  He grins. “I mean, I think so. But it’s nice to hear you say it.”

  I roll my eyes, turning away from him. “Mum!” I shout. “Dad!”

  “In here!” Mum shouts back. It sounds like she’s in the kitchen.

  I lead Shepard through the living room. Pacey and Priya are playing Nintendo. “Hey,” I say flatly. “This is Shepard.”

  Shepard’s ready to launch his usual charm attack, but my siblings just nod and say, “Hey” without looking away from the screen.

  Mum’s in the kitchen, standing right under the light, holding Pip’s hand. Pip’s 10, he’s the youngest. He’ll start at Watford in the autumn.

  “Penelope,” Mum says. “How’s that reversal spell you’re working on?”

  “It’s promising,” I say.

  “Pip’s got a splinter. I thought I’d try reversing an ‘Under my skin.’”

  “You’re not casting experimental spells on my hand,” Pip says.

  “I’m good with splinters,” Shepard says. “Can I help?”

  “What spell do you use?” Mum asks.

  “I usually use tweezers,” he says.

  She looks up at him for the first time. “You’re Penny’s friend with the urgent problem.”

  “Mum,” I say, “this is Shepard.”

  He holds out his hand, but she’s already looking back at Pip, holding her wand over his palm.

  “No experiments,” Pip says. “I play piano!”

  “You never practice,” she says.

  “I will!” he swears.

  She hitches her wand up in a plucking motion. “No trespassing!”

  Pip yelps. A bit of something flies out his hand.

  “I can’t believe that worked,” Mum says.

  Pip yanks his hand back—“Mum, you’re the worst”—and stomps out of the room.

  Mum finally gives Shepard and me her full attention.

  Simon says my mother and I are two peas in a pod. “She’s you in twenty-five years, when you give even fewer fucks.” I don’t see it. Mum’s much tougher than I am. And much smarter. And much more confident about her hair.

  “I don’t think we’ve met before,” she says to Shepard. “What year were you at Watford?”

  “Shepard’s a—an American,” I say, before he can say anything.

  Mum’s mouth twitches downward. She’d been so pleased to hear that Micah and I were done. “Martin!” she yelled at my dad. “Penelope has finally grown out of the American!” She must think I immediately replaced him.

  “Where’s Dad?” I ask. “I want his opinion, too.”

  “He had to run out,” Mum says. “You’re stuck with me. Are you two hungry?” She opens the refrigerator. “There are fish fingers, I think. Is Simon hungry, as well? I probably don’t have that many fish fingers.”

  “Simon isn’t here.”

  Mum looks over her shoulder. “Isn’t he? Did you have him surgically detached?”

  Shepard laughs.

  I frown at him, but Mum finally smiles. “I just assumed, when you said ‘urgent, interesting problem,’ that Simon was involved.”

  “It isn’t urgent,” Shepard says, like he doesn’t want anyone to fuss.

  I huff. “I respectfully disagree!”

  “Out with it,” Mum says, leaning back against the counter. She’s rubbing her forehead, like she’s already heard and been exhausted by our problem. This is how it’s been since Mum took charge of Watford—like she’s always down to her last nerve.

  “Well,” I say, “Shepard is cursed.”

  “What kind of cursed?”

  “He made an unfortunate—”

  “Does the curse keep him from speaking for himself?”

  I just stop myself from answering her.

  “No,” Shepard says, looking directly in Mum’s eyes and squaring his shoulders. I can see he’d like to make this light, the way he makes everything light. But there’s no light way to say it. He’s smiling, and then he isn’t. “I lost my soul to a demon.”

  “Oh, Shepard,” Mum says, already disappointed in him. “You didn’t take their sweets.”

  “Ah, no,” he says, smiling again. “Only because I wasn’t offered any.”

  “Who summoned a demon? Do people just leave the gates open in America? Have you all found a way to frak the Netherworlds?”

  “I…” I’ve never seen Shepard at a loss for words. He tips his head down. “I summoned one.”

  She looks appalled. “Why?”

  He winces. “To see if I could?”

  “Oh, Shepard. Penelope, where do you find these tragic morons?”

  “Mum!”

  “Honestly!” She waves at Shepard. “Go on, take off your jacket. Let’s see them. I do wish Dad was here. We’ve only ever read about demon entrapment. There hasn’t been a documented case since the 1800s. An ounce of prevention goes a long way—it’s like cholera.”

  Shepard takes off his jacket and looks down at the floor. He’s wearing a T-shirt underneath. The tattoos start at his wrists and wrap around his arms. They’re incredibly intricate, and it’s hard for your eyes to focus on them. Sometimes they look like vines, and sometimes they look like writing—writing in an alphabet that uses all the letters we know and about a dozen we don’t.

  “Hell’s spells…” Mum says, whistling. “You are well and truly fucked, young man.”

  “Mum! You’re being rude, even for you.”

  “I’m sorry, Shepard. I don’t mean to be rude. But this is a … breathtaking hole you’ve dug for yourself. Do your parents know?”

  “No. They don’t.”

  “Where’s my phone, we’re going to need photos. And a team of occultists and a demonic Rosetta Stone. Morgana, what a mess.” She’s warming to the problem now, and I can’t help but be relieved. For a moment I thought she was going to let Shepard go to hell just because she was in a bad mood.

  “There’s no recent scholarship,” she says, lifting Shepard’s shirtsleeve with her fingertips, “but there is precedence. The last outbreak was at Watford. A secret society … Never join a secret society, either of you. How bored do you have to be to do terrible things for the sake of having a secret? Wealthy people can’t even earn their secrets with any integrity.”

  Shepard is keeping wisely—and shockingly—quiet.

  Mum has her phone out. She’s focusing the camera on his elbow. “Do you remember when it happened? How old were you?”

  “I do. I was twenty—it was two years ago.”

  “Well old enough to know better.”

  “Yes.”

  “Did someone put you up to it? Were you tricked?”

  “No. I was just … curious.”

  “About demons, Shepard?”

  “I’m curious about everything, Mrs. Bunce.”

  “Dr. Bunce. And I’m curious to hear how you think you’re getting out of this predicament?”

  “I don’t think I am.”

  “What?” She’s pulled away, and she’s looking down her nose at him.

  “I think I’m well and truly fucked. Just like you said.”

  She glares up at him. “I was only insulting you, Shepard. I was trying to make you feel so bad about your actions that you won’t repeat them; it’s a common parental ta
ctic. You are well and truly fucked, but I don’t intend to leave you this way.” She smiles at him, just a little.

  He’s so grateful for it that he smiles back widely. “Thank you, Dr. Bunce.”

  Mum tucks her phone in her pocket. “Now, let’s see your wand. Is it compromised, as well?”

  “I don’t have a wand, I’m not a magician.”

  She jerks her head up at him and then at me. “You’re not a magician? What are you? You don’t smell like a pixie. No offence.”

  He laughs. “I’m a Talker. I mean—a Normal. I figured that was obvious.”

  Mum’s got her wand pointed at him before her chin has finished dropping. “Let bygones be bygones!”

  Shepard lurches back like he’s been shoved.

  “Rock-a-bye, baby!” Mum shouts.

  Shepard slumps forward. Mum and I catch him.

  “Mum! What are you—”

  “Penelope Leigh Bunce, have you lost your mind?”

  “Have you?”

  “You brought a Normal into our house?!”

  “Mum, he needs help!”

  “All Normals need help!”

  “Mum—”

  “You told him about magic? About our family?”

  “If you’d just listen! Shepard is my friend. He helped me through—Well, I found myself in a very dicey situation…”

  “Imagine my surprise.”

  “Mum, that’s not fair.”

  “Penelope, you’re so addicted to danger that you manufacture it as soon as things get quiet!”

  “I’ve manufactured nothing! I wasn’t responsible for the Mage!”

  “No, but you were one of three children in five hundred who couldn’t steer clear of him. You are recklessly bent on finding trouble.”

  “That is an extreme and unfair mischaracterization.”

  “Is it? So there’s not a demon-cursed, American Normal in my kitchen?”

  Shepard is slipping out of our arms. We lower him to the floor. “Mum, he’s my friend.”

  “I’m sure he is! I’m sure you befriended him the moment you realized what a hopeless disaster he is!”

  “I didn’t know, actually.” I’m making sure Shepard doesn’t hit his head on the tile.

  “It’s a sixth sense, then.”

  “Your disapproval is well noted, Mother. I feel bad about my actions, and I won’t repeat them. Can you just help him now? He really is in trouble.”