“But bringing down the line will return us to the control of the demons.”

“Stop calling them demons. They are not demons. They are our creators. Our parents. Everything we have and everything we are, we got from them.”

“You are out of your mind.”

Emily’s head tilted to the side and her lips pulled back, revealing gritted teeth. She leaned violently forward, her hands white-knuckled and digging into the arms of her chair. My own muscles pulled taut, preparing themselves if she were to pounce. It may only have been Joe’s position at her feet that kept her from doing just that, but he proved barrier enough to slow Emily’s building rage. She sensed my body preparing to respond in kind to any violence, and she forced herself back against the chair, loosening her grip on its arms. “I am the sanest witch you have ever met. It is only your willfulness, your ignorance that makes you doubt me.” She regained control of herself, righting her head and relaxing her shoulders. “I brought you here to attempt to correct that ignorance.”

“All right,” I said, holding my hands out before me, palms down. “I’m sorry. I’m listening.”

“Thank you for the apology. I accept it,” she said, the final traces of tension disappearing from her face. She folded her hands and assumed a thoughtful pose. As she collected her thoughts, I stood in silence, calculating my odds of making it to Adam and sliding us out of here. “The old ones,” she said, interrupting my train of thought. “When they found our planet, no humans existed, leave alone witches. The small mammals from which we’ve descended were millions of years away from even developing prehensile thumbs on their own. We were tree-dwelling mice, doing our best to hide from the masters of this world, but our visitors saw potential in us, and they decided to make a long-term investment in our future. They claimed our world for us. They cleared the land for us.”

“You are saying they wiped out the dinosaurs?”

“Yes, they erased the dinosaurs, and everything that took their place until we were ready to rise to supremacy. They were always here to help us. Teach us. Protect us. Change us. Perfect us.”

“Enslave us. Even if what you say is true, even if they did play a nurturing role in our early development, they didn’t help us out of the kindness of their hearts. They engineered us to be their servants. Food, even. The witches rebelled to give us free will.”

“Free will to what? Kill each other in wars? Poison the planet with toxins? Gorge ourselves on chemical foods while millions starve? These are the products of your treasured free will. The old ones, our guides, would never have allowed such madness. There are six and a half billion humans on this planet, and that number is burgeoning by the minute. That’s six billion too many for the world to support. Humans are out of balance with nature. They are a virus, spreading, destroying. The human race is the ultimate ecological nightmare.”

“So you bring down the line. You let your old ones back in. Who decides who gets to live and which six billion people have to die?”

“You could. If you help them, I am sure they will let you determine who are the most worthy of life.”

I shook my head in disbelief. “I am not qualified to make that decision.”

“No? A nurse who dedicates her life to healing or a drug dealer who murdered his grandmother? Pick one.”

She stood, and pushing past Joe, she began to circle me, forcing me to turn. The movement combined with the blinking of the skull lights disoriented me. “That’s an extreme example. Life isn’t so simple,” I said. “It isn’t so black and white.”

“Oh, my dear girl, it will amaze you how quickly clarity comes to you. How soon you will realize that those shades of gray you worry about are such unnecessary complications.” She stopped and stood before me, the bruised light casting nightmarish shadows on her face.

“Those beings you want to help,” I said, “they want to enslave the human race.”

“Humans need to be subjugated for their own good and for the good of the planet.”

“My son will not live as a slave.”

“Of course not,” she said as she tilted her head toward me, a wrinkle forming between her eyes. “Your son will reign as a king. He will be truly free, not a slave of the line. My darling, you defend the line, but you know nothing of what it is or the blood that the witches spilled in its creation. Tell me, dear, what do you know about it?”

The dream I’d had a few days ago came to mind, and I found myself remembering it in vivid detail. I watched again as a faceless man slithered like a serpent away from a pyramid. Nearby obelisks lit up as lightning struck them. A whirring moan echoed from stone circles. I shook it off. “Pretty close to nothing, but what I do know is that you used me.” I paused and an odd thought hit me. “I have a special connection to the line, one that none of the anchors has,” I said, realizing the truth of the words as I said them. “What is it? Why me?” I asked.

“You are the witch of the prophecy. You are the one who was born to end the line and deliver us all from its tyranny. Why else do you think Ginny separated you from your magic? Why else do you think the united families have continued to estrange you from the power that is rightfully yours?”

She had sidestepped my question. I knew I’d never get any truth out of her, and the longer I allowed her to keep us here, the more likely it seemed that things would not end well. “No, you are wrong. You’ll have to find another messiah. Now let Adam and me go.”

“You are both free to leave whenever you would like, but remember this: They will never bring you into their fold. The anchors are terrified of you, since they know you will be the one to hold them accountable for their sins. Let me help you. Let me teach you what the line really is. How it imprisons you and how it will imprison your son . . . that is, if the other anchors even allow him to be born.” She paused and watched my face, making sure that her words had made the impact she’d hoped they would. “Half witch, half fairy? Certainly a challenge to the status quo. A wild card. The anchors, they don’t like challenges, especially ones they fear might be out of their control. If they learned the truth about my dear grandson . . .”

“Are you threatening me?” My hands curled into claws, ready to strike.

“No, my dear. Just the opposite. I am warning you. I am explaining to you how best to protect yourself and your child. I would never, ever betray your secret to the others, but you are already enough of an outlier in your own right, and I can guarantee that the anchors will also keep an eye on your little one, waiting to remove him from the equation should they ever feel the need. You’ll have to find a way to hide his true nature, or they will kill him just as they killed Paul. Just as they would have killed you and Maisie if they’d known Erik was your father.” Joe came and took her arm. “And just as they would try to murder Josef if they found out Erik was his father.”

I stood there dumbstruck as I looked at Joe with new eyes. The hair, the cleft chin, the high forehead. He did bear a strong resemblance to Erik. Leaning in, he placed a passionate kiss on Emily’s lips. I watched as animal electricity surged between them. Emily pushed him away and laughed. “Relax. He’s only your half brother.” He took her in his arms and pulled her near, so that her back was leaning against his chest. He caressed her, his fingers lingering near her hardening nipples, and nuzzled his face in her hair.