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"How did you find this place?" Aislinn asked, prettyany hope for a nice faainst your kind"

"There's a spot about three feet across in the northwest corner," Call answered "The wards are broken there I can fix them if you want" Aislinn was obviously taken aback, but she recovered quickly "No need I'll send Finley out to redo it to" Since the Brannicks were descended from a powerful White Witch, some of them still had residual powers Apparently, this was the case with Finley "You can go help her," Aislinn added, to Izzy "It's time you learned to make wards"

"As for hoe found you," Dad said, "it wasn't easy Call told me that he'd sent you to the Brannicks, but when he tried to use his et a lock on you"

"It was like you had just disappeared," Call said "No locator spell worked, no tracing hex"

"It was the Itineris," I explained "It didn't knohat to do with icked" Dad nodded "I suspected asour way here Call didn't think it ise for me to travel by Itineris in mycurrent state, so I'm afraid we've had to travel the old-fashioned way"

"It took you three weeks to fly fro an eyebrow

"We didn't co his arms over his chest, a scowl on his face "There was a lot of other stuff to deal with"

"What kind of stuff?" I asked

Dad rose to his feet and started to pace "After the Brannicks and ll'Occhio di Dio attacked Council Headquarters in the spring, there were only five Council members left"

"That wasn't us," Aislinn retorted "Or The Eye, for thatand stared at her "What?"

Briefly, Aislinn told Dad the sa that the Casnoffs had set the fire themselves, only to blame it on their eneed ten years "I wish I could say that that's preposterous But after what I've seen Lara Casnoff doIn any case, the other three members of the Council were killed when Thorne Abbey was destroyed" I'd seen one of those three, Kristopher, killed, but it was a shock to learn the other two, Elizabeth and Roderick, were gone, too "Lara and I are the only estured to his tattoos-"not exactly useful I'm also dead"

"What?"

"A few days after Thorne Abbey burned down, Lara Casnoff called a hugewarlock," Call said to et in There iu announcement that your dad had been murdered by The Eye" He nodded toward Aislinn "With the help of the Brannicks" Aislinn swore under her breath, and Mom lowered her head

"Okay," I said slowly "Look, I get that that's bad, but can't you just pop up and be like, 'Hey, here I am! Totally not dead!'"

"I could," said Dad, "but if it suits the Casnoffs' purposes fortells "

"What do you think the Casnoffs' purposes are?" Molanced at her, then over to iu demons seems like the only course of action

They have Daisy, and they ed to corral Nick There haven't been any other attacks linked to hiht The Eye, Nick had gotten loose and gone on soht of it stillabout the de?" I asked Cal

He shook his head "Not specifically All she said was that she and her sister had a plan to rid the world of the Brannicks and The Eye once and for all"

"Speaking of-" Dad broke in "Sophie, have you had any contact with Archer Cross?" Every eye in the rooe to coverwas painted all over it "No I thought maybe" I turned to Cal "Did you see hiet Dad at Thorne Abbey?" It's not like I expected Call to go, Yes, I did In fact, I was keeping hio But when Call ot there," the words physically hurt

You're lucky, I reminded myself Your dad is here So is Cal And Jenna is safe What were the chances that you'd get everyone back?

"The cell door had been broken down," Call continued, "so your dad and I figured The Eye took hi?" I asked Dad