Page 98 of The Sinner and the Scholar
“Shh,” I hold her as she suffers a seizure. “You’re safe. You’re one of us. We protect our own.” I know I can find a way if I have enough time. This relic will work. I just need to calm my mind. Maybe—
“Don’t overthink it, Thea.”
My heart clenches. It’s not Wesley’s voice. Not a poor attempt at humor.
No, it was Prue who whispered the words. Prue, who first said them to me decades ago.
The lights dim and flicker in the room. The temperature cools. Something is coming. Something unholy. Death? From his quiet spot, Asmodeus glances around, sensing the same thing. Then his demon black eyes latch onto me. Talons distend from his stained black fingertips. In the span of a blink, he pushes in and whispers something to Prue. She nods, and then he reaches inside her chest and squeezes her heart until it stops.
The viper attacks. Tawny launches at Asmodeus so fast that he can’t block her. But his lips twist into a parody of a smile. He captures her face between his hands and kisses her. She thrashes and digs her nails into his cheek. Blood wells through claw marks, but he doesn’t remove his lips from hers.
We break free of the spell grief has cast on us. Every Sinner kicks into action. We launch to rescue our sister but grab air. The prince of hell evades us like we’re moving in jelly, but he casually steps to the side and gives Tawny a wink.
“Why?” she shouts.
A dark look flashes in his eyes. “Revenge.”
Then his visage shimmers, and he disappears.
Leila runs to the spot he vacated.
“Nothing. He’s gone.”
I turn back to Prue. Raven puts her fingers on Prue’s lifeless eyelids and closes them. It feels as though Asmodeus squeezed my heart, not Prue’s. What good is an archangel’s power if it can’t beat free will? I know she wanted this. But she didn’t know what we know. She didn’t know about the gospel.
Maybe if…
Rage builds inside me. The pressure is a kettle about to blow. I can barely breathe from the heat stampeding through my blood. What the fuck are we doing here? Why are we wasting our lives this way?
Wesley touches my back, and I crumple. Everything rushes out of me in an anguished sob of sorrow. I cry so loud and hard that I feel like the heavens open. My fist tightens around the staff. I pour all my grief and fear into it, and I demand the angel who gave this staff his power to listen to me.
“Take Prue,” I urge through sobs. “She’s suffered enough, sacrificed everything! Don’t you dare leave her for the darkness, or I swear to the Holy Mother I will find a way up there and make you pay.”
When my words die, the silence is deafening. My sisters look at me, wide and bleary-eyed. The men fear me. The Reverend Mother still holds Prue’s lifeless hand, and nothing has changed.
Nothing except the relic heating in my hands, glowing without permission. The light grows, but that’s all it does. It feels like an acknowledgment of some kind—I hope. I pray. And then I look at Prue’s face and gasp.
“Can anyone else see that?” Raven mumbles.
“Is she smiling?” Tawny sobs.
“Love, I’m sorry, but I don’t see a smile,” Wesley says softly.
It’s just us five Sinners with the Sight who see. I don’t know what it means. But then the oddest thing happens. A bird lands on the windowsill closest to the bed. At first, I fear it’s a crow, but it’s too small.
“A mockingbird.” I laugh through my tears, dazed.
Elvis has left the building, but the mockingbird is not dead. It pecks twice on the glass, looks straight at me, winks, then flies away.
“It winked,” I mumble. “I swear to God it winked.”
“Does that mean she’s in Heaven?” Leila asks, her voice trembling.
“It has to be,” Mercy replies. “What else would it mean?”
“Wherever she is… she’s free.” I look at the relic with reverence, a little ashamed of my previous threat.If that was your doing, thank you. It pulses in response.
Movement in my peripheral catches my attention. Zeke is standing back from us all, his hands in his pockets, his jaw set, his eyes bleak. Jinx has made herself comfortable around his neck. While everyone is still occupied with their emotions, I walk to him and quietly touch the relic to his arm. I wish him well.
