If I was just willing to lie to myself about everything that mattered…

I could be happy.

Carter dropped me off at home after we made appearances at three postgame parties in three hours. When I got inside, I was so tired that I practically swayed on my feet.

But halfway down the hall to my room, I was stopped by my mother’s silhouette in the near blackness.

“Alexis?” she asked. Her voice was strained. “Do you have a second?”

“Sure,” I said, turning on my bedroom light and sitting on my bed. For a second I was afraid that she’d noticed something was up with Carter. Had somebody called her? A nosy teacher? A meddlesome parent?

“It’s about Kasey,” Mom said, sitting in my desk chair. She took a deep breath. “She was using my computer earlier, and she left, and I—I guess I’ll admit it, I was snooping. I checked the Internet history.”

The breath went out of my lungs. “What did you find?”

“Oh, Alexis.” Mom closed her eyes and shook her head. “Weird stuff. Spells, charms, books about dead people…Something called a creature? A creatura? I don’t know. Everything she was supposed to be staying away from.”

“Wow,” I said.

Deep inside me, something perked up.

Something dark.

“I don’t know what to do. I have that phone number, but I’m afraid to get her in trouble without at least talking it over. But then I think about last year—talking wouldn’t have helped then.”

This was it. The perfect chance to get Kasey—and her traitorous hidden agenda—out of the way.

“You spend time with her. Did you know about any of this?”

No, Mom. Wow, it sounds dangerous. I hope she’s not planning anything violent.

I stared at my mother. The voice in my head tried again, louder this time.

No, Mom. Wow, it sounds dangerous—

I closed my eyes, inwardly focusing every bit of strength I had left inside me.

“Um…you know what?” I said. “She mentioned it to me, actually—it’s a project she’s doing for school. She’s taking European history, and I think they’re on the medieval unit. You know, Merlin, Camelot…”

Mom sat back while a fresh pulse of pain worked its way up my arms.

“She hasn’t been acting weird at all,” I said, and the words physically hurt to say, like I had a mouthful of tiny shards of glass. “Trust me. I’m on the lookout.”

It was like Mom had been holding a breath inside herself for three hours. She sighed—a big, quivering openmouthed sigh that could just as easily have ended in a sob. “Oh, thank God.”

“I’ll let you know if anything changes, though,” I said.

“Thank you so much, Alexis,” Mom whispered. She got up, took my face in her hands, and kissed me on the cheek.

As soon as she was gone, the headache began, way back at the base of my skull. It grew stronger and stronger until I couldn’t think about anything but the throbbing pain in my head, like a baby dragon trying to break out of its egg.

I didn’t brush my teeth or wash my face or change out of my dress. I just pulled the pillow over my eyes and braced myself for a very long night.

But a minute later, my door opened.

“Lexi?”

I wasn’t asleep. I didn’t even pretend to be. I flipped over and looked at Kasey. Being distracted soothed the aching in my head, so I sat up and turned on my light.

She didn’t come into my room. She leaned against the doorjamb, examining me from a distance, like I was an animal in a zoo.

“What do you want?” I asked.

“You lied to Mom,” she said.

“So?”

“Why? You could have turned me in. Then I’d be out of your way.”

But part of me didn’t want to turn Kasey in. She was still my sister.

Because everyone deserves a second chance, said the voice. And it’s not too late for you. If you just take the oath, you won’t be a liar anymore. And I’d be so proud of you.

If I said all the right things, there was a really good chance I could use a combination of guilt, threats, and charm to coax her into taking the oath, joining us for real.

But for some reason, I didn’t want to do that, either.

I just wanted to go to sleep.

Not that I was any less furious with Kasey.

“I felt like it, okay?” I said. “Now leave me alone before I change my mind.”

FARRIN AGREED TO MEET me at eleven. When I pulled into the parking lot, she was waiting for me outside the main door, reading a magazine in a very Sunshine Club– like manner. The difference was that this magazine cover was a picture she’d taken.

She stopped in front of suite six and unlocked it. “What did you bring to work on today?”

“Actually,” I said, “I was hoping we could talk.”

“Is everything all right?”

I followed her to her office but didn’t answer.

She sat down and gave me a concerned smile.

“How much do you know about Aralt?” I asked.

“Ah,” she said. She was silent for such a long time that I was afraid I’d offended her. Then she turned to me. “How much do you know?”

I shook my head. “Not enough.”

She pursed her lips and stared at me. “Things are happening that you don’t understand.”

“To put it mildly.”

“Have you ever heard the term ‘a charmed life’?”

“Of course.”

“And you know what it means.”

“That things go well for you,” I said. “It’s like being lucky.”

“The phrase is tossed around these days, but once upon a time, it actually meant something. To lead a charmed life was to lead a life that was…touched. By a supernatural force. A spell, or an incantation—”

“Or an oath.”

“Precisely. Now, when you have this force acting inside you, it’s a form of energy. And the laws of the universe state that energy is neither created nor destroyed. It’s only transferred.”

“And how does that happen?”

“All of the wonderful changes in your life,” she said. “How you look and feel. How your mind works. The energy is burned off through all of those things. You sublimate it into your regular life—it becomes your edge.”

“But not every change is wonderful,” I said, thinking of the odd, blank look in Carter’s eyes, my moment of feeling like I could kill my sister.

“Aralt cares for us, Alexis. He wants the best for us. It’s all he wants. So if you are experiencing problems, you have to question your own precepts.”

I wasn’t quite sure what a precept was, but I got the distinct feeling I was being told it was all in my head. “But what does he get out of it?”

“When you’re at your best, he’s at his best,” Farrin said. “It’s as simple as that.”

She considered it simple? That a supernatural being was feeding off of us?

“Have you cried lately?” I asked.

“I have nothing to cry about.” She folded her hands and looked directly into my eyes. “And neither do you.”

I slumped lower in my chair.

“I care about you, too, Alexis,” she said. “I don’t like to see you struggling needlessly. You could make this very easy for yourself.”

Just swallow the blue pill, right?

Farrin was staring right at me. “This could be the best thing that ever happened to you,” she said softly.

“But I—” I stopped mid-sentence.

Suddenly I couldn’t remember what I was going to say.

All I could think was, This could be the best thing that ever happened to me.

“This is a lot to process, Alexis. Why don’t we look at your photos? I don’t believe that you didn’t bring anything,” she said.

“Well, I did, but…”

“Let’s get some work done,” she said gently. “You shot color, didn’t you? I’m excited to see the pictures. You can think about the rest of it later.”

I can think about the rest of it later. She had a point. I could think at home. I couldn’t process color negatives at home.

The office phone rang. “Excuse me, please,” she said, grabbing the portable handset from her desk. “Hello?…Oh, yes, I’ll be home by five…No, don’t. I’ll order in.”