Page 37 of The Lies We Conjure
The Hegemony name literally meant power. It wasn’t a mistake or a quirk of language and luck that the word “hegemony”—the prominence of one over others—described exactly who we were. It was a purposeful rebranding choice by Mercy Hegemony after saving the Four Lines from disaster. Since that moment, her descendants were Elemental witches, yes, but also so much more—supreme rulers of the Four Lines for the past four hundred years, as dictated by our hold over the powerful master relics that were key to the survival of modern magic within North America.
And my cousins and I all had very different ideas of what that power meant.
Ursula primly folded her hands atop her desk. The four gemstones of the High Sorcerer’s ring she wore glinted mildly in the dull light. Her movements were always so unhurried, smooth, deliberate. Steady. Just like her voice.
“When I die,” Ursula had announced without an ounce of hesitation or recoil, “our fissures will come to light.”
Sixty years. That was how long Ursula Hegemony had held the title of High Sorcerer. One year after the death of her older brother, Matthias, and two years after the death of her mother, Elvire, who had been High Sorcerer for fifty years.
Ursula had been the High Sorcerer for so long that a power vacuum would be inevitable. The history books along these walls, in the library, the turret reading room, heck, in my dorm room at school, were filled with examples of the same, all over the world.
We were not the same, though ourhegemony—so to speak—was quite different.
“We will crack and bleed, and fester until we’re healed,” Ursula had continued, her tourmaline eyes unwavering. There was magic in that, a thread of power that meant what she said in this here and now would never fade from my memory. “Some will see this as a game to be won. Whatyoumust see it as is a set of instructions. Auden, it is crucial that you do exactly as I say. Is that understood?”
“Yes, Ursula.”
A stiff nod—curt, hard, decisive. “Now, here is what you must do.”
All those months ago, Ursula had been right.
Our fissures ruptured at the surface.
They spider-webbed every which way, the shotgun blast of ice cracking on a frozen lake before shattering and swallowing whole anything heavier than a feather.
Between the four High Families. Within our own. Within this very room.
Ursula’s murder is simply the first crack visible to all of us. A sign of what’s shattered beneath.
We will crack and bleed, and fester until we’re healed.
I hope she’s right about the end. I fear it’s the first time she’s ever been wrong.
The fissures have just begun, and even with Ursula’s words looping through my mind, I already don’t know how to repair them. I don’t know if I’ll get a chance. The breaks I can’t see—yet—could widen to gaping chasms by the end of Ursula’s final directive. I think that’s more likely than our crevices healing up, our “mostunusual and unbreakable family” knitting back together, stronger than ever.
Ruminating, I stare into the flames of the study hearth. There’s always a fire in this room. Day or night, season after season, hour after hour. Until I’d walked into cold embers tonight, I’d thought those flames to be as endless as they were alive. Now I know they died along with Ursula, like the grass outside, like the wilting plants in this room and all along this floor. Death spilling over and tainting anything that had Ursula’s magic in it. Even me. Even my cousins. Maybe everyone trapped in this estate.
Winter returns with the snick of a lock latching closed. I have my back to her, sitting cross-legged in the right-hand guest chair I always used when Ursula was alive. Evander has claimed the large leather desk chair, the fire casting a shimmer of gold on one side of his face. His expression flickers with all the things he’s planning to say.
We haven’t so much as exchanged a word since Winter left with the Blackgates. Just assumed our current positions and retreated to our thoughts.
“I told you not to move,” she scolds with a sigh.
My gaze snaps away from the fire. “I thought I’d get comfortable. This conversation won’t be short.”
Winter drops into the other guest chair. She slips off her ridiculous heels and tucks her knees to her chest, the floral-print silk of her dress hugging her skin as tightly as the vise cage of her strong, tennis-player arms.
“The length of this conversation depends entirely on how quickly you want to tell the truth,” Evander says, leaning on the desk. “What did you know, Auden?”
This time, because he’s seated, his elbows dig into the leather blotter on either side of the page that had been the will and is now our clue, his hands cupping his biceps. His jacket is off again, just as it was in the garden. His shoulders strain against the brilliant white fabric, and his jaw works in his heavily hung head.
I know Evander’s stressed. I know he’s sad. I know he can’t believe this any more than I can.
But I have no idea why, after what’s happened tonight, his first inclination is to aim all his anger at me.
I straighten my trousers where they’ve creased. “I would say you’d have to be more specific, but the answer is the same whether you’re referring to what happened to Ursula or to what was in the will. I didn’t know.”
Evander inhales a thin, angry breath. “I’ll try again, and put it as plainly as possible: Did you know she was going to die?”
